One Minute Monologues 039

God is hiding in our life
and we are looking in the Bible.
There aren’t enough Bible studies
to lead us to the God
that is hiding in our life.
To find God,
we have to look where God is hiding.
Start by looking in the mirror.
Start by studying who looks back
when you look in the mirror.
That person–
the one reflected in the mirror–
is concealing God from you.
Throw all your Bibles away
and buy more mirrors.
What we seek is found
in the life of the person
looking back at us
from the mirror.
And where does that person stop
and her, and his, life begin?
We ARE our life–
the life we have lived,
and the life we have not lived.
Both lives are reflected back to us
from the mirror.
The impact of both lives
are there for those who have eyes to see.
Everything is there to be seen
by those who look with compassion and grace.
Why would we look at ourselves
with anything less?
We have to look at ourselves looking
to see all there is to see,
to know all there is to know
about the one who knows what we know.
We look for God somewhere else
because we cannot bear to know
what we have to know
to know God hiding
in the one place we will never look.

We all have to have a place and a time
where and when we can do what we do
the way we would do it
with no one but ourselves to please
with our effort and outcome.
Too many of us live to please someone else–
even after they are long dead or gone.
We cannot free ourselves from their influence,
or find ourselves because of their interference.
We need to write our own Emancipation Proclamation,
and live to make it so
in our lifetime.
We have to have a place and a time
in which we are free to be who we are,
pursuing the things that are important to us,
for their own sake,
whether they matter to anyone else or not.
Our life depends on it.
What could life possibly be without it?

04/13/2017 — The complete absence of compassion,
kindness, graciousness,
generosity, gentleness,
warmth, good faith
and all values similar
in intent and expression
from the Republican Party
and its representatives
is the only thing
worthy of our attention,
scrutiny, investigation
and exploration.
Why are Republicans
so heartless,
uncaring,
merciless
and cruel?
04/13/2017 — Trump has effectively ended Planned Parenthood in states with Republican controlled legislatures.

Republicans have done not one good thing–not one thing for the good of the people they were elected to serve.

04/14/2017 — The role of government is whatever
Republicans say it is
in any moment,
but, basically it comes down to this:
“The role of government
is to NOT TELL ME WHAT TO DO!”
However, if Republicans don’t like
what YOU are doing,
the role of government then becomes
“to tell YOU what to do.”

Republicans have no grasp of
“the work of government.”
They want government to disappear
when it is in their way,
and to reappear when they need it
to force their way on everyone else.

Republicans think reducing the size of government
will diminish the government’s ability
to interfere with their life,
and will open the way to profiteering
and financial gain
at the expense of all other considerations.
Having more money today
than they had yesterday
is the central motive of the Republicans
who drive the Party.
“Profit at any price”
is the core motto of Republicans.
“Why should I pay for someone else’s
(fill in the blank)
healthcare,
education,
food,
shelter,
etc.?”
Is the question Republicans ask of government’s role
in health and human services,
and is the mainstay of Republican opposition to taxes,
and to Republican resistance
to the place of government in their life.

Republicans are certain
that everyone could be as independent
and as self-reliant as they are
if everyone were “disciplined” and “really tried.”
And that those who are dependent
and/or disadvantaged in any way
are only getting what they deserve
for refusing to be self-disciplined
and for not “trying.”

Republicans live in their own self-validating world,
and are incapable of grasping the concept
of another world at a variance with their own,
in a “let them eat cake (if they have no bread)”
kind of way.

It doesn’t matter why we dream,
where dreams come from,
or what dreams mean.
What matters is how we work with them,
what we do with them,
how we understand them,
how we honor them,
how we listen to them.
Approach dreams as though
they are messages to you from you,
whether they are,
or not.
Just pretend that they are,
and set about the task of deciphering
the metaphor,
the parable,
that comes to us as we sleep.
Pretend each dream is saying,
“This is how it is in your life at this point.
What are you going to do about it?”
What is the dream saying about our life situation?
What is the dream calling us to do?
Pretend that dreams are a Rorchach ink blot,
and that it is our place to interpret them
out of our present life experience,
saying what they mean to us,
and what they are asking of us.
Keep a dream journal,
writing the dream down
each morning
before it disappears
in the rush of life.
Think about it through the day.
See what occurs to you.
See where it goes.

Live until you die,
that’s my best advice.
Start by making a Life/Death Assessment
twice a week.
Sit quietly
and decide if you are mostly alive,
or mostly dead.
Then ask yourself
what you could do to be more alive
and less dead.
And do it.
We live best
when we live in the service of life.
When we mean it.
Intend it.
Devote ourselves to it.
Every day.
Life is not what happens to us.
Life is what we do
with what happens to us.
In spite of what happens to us.
All our life long.

04/15/2017 — Being conscious
is knowing what we know.
Knowing what we know
is being self-transparent.
Being self-transparent
is not kidding ourselves.
Not kidding ourselves
is squaring up to
our contradictions,
dichotomies,
discrepancies,
and incompatibilities–
reconciling what can be reconciled,
and bearing the pain
of mutually exclusive polarities–
while being responsible
and holding ourselves accountable
for what we do
about being who we are,
where we are,
when we are,
how we are,
in each situation as it arises
all our life long.
You can see why we might want
to live unconscious
of most of what we know.
04/15/2017 — Republicans do not see it coming.
They actually believe the bad stuff on all levels isn’t real.
They are lost in denial
and live in service to the ideal of unlimited profits–
that is profits unrestricted by the regulations/protections
that increase costs and decrease profits.
Republicans are profit driven–
profit at any price driven–
and blind to the reality of that price,
which is to be paid by us all.
Republicans bear fully the weight
of their refusal to see, hear, or understand–
as much as did those about whom Jesus said,
“Father, forgive them, they don’t know what they are doing.”
They don’t know
and don’t know
that they don’t know,
because knowing
would require too much of them.
Let them wake up,
and let us see
if they can forgive themselves.
04/15/2017 — We spend a lot of our time
waiting it out.
Waiting for the door to open,
a door,
any door.
Waiting for the regime to change.
Waiting for something to shift,
to stir to life,
to call our name…
We wait sometimes
not knowing that we are waiting.
Luke Skywalker was waiting,
not knowing.
Obi-wan Kenobi was waiting,
knowng he was waiting.
When it is our time to wait,
it helps to know that we are waiting,
even if we don’t know what
we are waiting for.
It keeps us alert,
knowing that,
but not what.
“Are you the one who is to come?”
asked John the Baptist’s disciples.
“Or, shall we look for another?”
Would that we knew whom to ask.
Not knowing, we wait,
hoping to know what
when we see it.
In the meantime,
it is enough to know that
we are waiting,
and wait.
04/16/2017— Big Creek 2004 01 — Great Smoky Mountains National Park, Haywood County, North Carolina, November, 2004

Here’s my take on Easter Morning:

Your new life–the life that is yours to live–
will eat your old life alive–
the life you are living AND
the life you dream of living.
In order to live the life that is your life to live,
you have to sacrifice the life you are living AND
the life you dream of living.
Resurrection means death.
You don’t live without dying.
You can’t “put your hand to the plow
and look back.”
You can’t step through the door
and keep following the cows
from the barn to the pasture
and back to the barn.
You have to live the life that is YOURS to live
and stop living the life
you were handed and told to live.
It is like dying to be born anew.
What’s it going to be?
Death?
Or resurrection?
The catch is that we die
by refusing to die,
and that is death
with no resurrection attached:
“Leave the dead to bury the dead.”

Easter has nothing whatsoever to do
with what happened to Jesus
2,000+ years ago.
It is solely about you and me
and whether we have what it takes
to die the death we have to die
in order to live the life that is ours to live.
Simply put:
We die when we live transparent to ourselves.
Living transparent to ourselves
means knowing what we know.
Means bearing the agony of our contradictions
and polarities.
Means No Denial.
Means living straight up face to face
with how it is really with us–
in the strength and confidence
of our belief in the validity and truth
of how it is also with us.
If you are going to believe in someone,
believe in YOU.
Believe you have all you need
to face all that is yours to face
and to find your way
by “entering the woods where it is the thickest,
where there is no path,”
wearing only “the face that was yours
before your grandparents were born.”
If you are going to believe anything,
believe that.
And take your place as the irreplaceable
individual you are
in the great company of those
who can receive you
as one of them
by being who only you can be.

04/16/2017— Donald Trump and Republicans
are clueless.
They look, but they do not see.
They see their projection of their assumptions
about how things are.
They see the world as they understand it to be.
They do not see what they are seeing
or how they are seeing it.
They think that with enough power
they can make things as they want them to be.
They think they can adjust the world to their liking.
They think it is “Only a matter of buying or bullying
their agenda, plan, ideology,
preferred way for things to be,
in place.”
They do not listen, see, understand.
Trump is amazed to learn
that health care is complicated,
or that the Chinese relationship
with North Korea is complicated,
or that there are aspects
to everything he thinks
that he hasn’t taken into consideration.
As with Trump so with Scott Pruitt
and Betsy Devos
and every cabinet member
and Republican office holder
on national, state, and local levels.
You cannot screw with this
without impacting that.
It isn’t about increasing corporate profits.
It is about improving the quality of life–
the civil and human rights–
of everyone.
It’s a tragedy that I cannot say that
in a way that Trump and Republicans
can understand.
04/16/2017 — To what extent are we
presenting ourselves
to ourselves and to others
in ways that conceal
who we are?

What are we denying about ourselves
to ourselves and/or to others?

All movement in our life
depends upon our moving
from self-deception
to self-realization
and self-transparency.

We cannot see anything
until we can see ourselves–
and hold everything
in compassionate,
non-judgmental,
awareness.
04/16/2017 — There are alcoholics
who deny they are alcoholics.
There are racists
who deny they are racists.
And so it goes
along the long line
of people who say they are not
who they are.
Our only task in life
is to know who we are
and to decide who we will be.

There is a reason people have affairs,
and the reason is not sexual.
The reason is their need
for vulnerability, authenticity, and intimacy.
Vulnerability, authenticity and intimacy
easily lend themselves to sexual expression,
but affairs need not be sexual.
Everything we do is a mirror.
We are all desperately seeking ourselves–
and doing everything we can do
to call ourselves to attend ourselves,
seeing, hearing, knowing, caring, loving,
accepting, looking, listening, inquiring…
In a word, being the kind of safe,
non-judgmental,
place for ourselves
that we seek in the arms of our lover.
My bet is
that the occupations/practices
with the highest incidence
of affairs
are those with the lowest regard/tolerance
for vulnerability, authenticity and intimacy.
We will have what we need,
and we need to be
vulnerable, authentic and intimate.
These things are the path,
the way,
to knowing who we are
and being at one with ourselves.
Integrity is at the heart of every affair.
My bet is
that the occupations/practices
with the lowest incidence of affairs
are those with the highest regard/tolerance
for vulnerability, authenticity and intimacy–
the ones that encourage/enable us
to know ourselves
and to be who we are.
Integrity is at the heart
of everything we do.
Everything we do is a mirror,
asking us to see who we are–
with loving, accepting, compassionate, comprehending eyes:
“Oh, Peter!
There you are!”

04/18/2017— Every mirror “of the soul,”
“of the self,”
is a two-way mirror,
revealing and concealing,
concealing and revealing.
The catch determining
what we see
is the matter
of how we look,
of whether we look at all.
04/18/2017— What we see hinges on how we look.

We have to look at our looking

to see what’s what.

04/18/2017— Jesus did not come
to make Christians of everybody.
Jesus did not come
to make Christians of anybody.
Jesus, by his own words
(placed in his mouth
by the Gospel of John,
so whose words they are
is an open question),
“came that they might have life,
and have it abundantly.”
Christians, of course,
equate “having life”
with “being saved”
as they declare “salvation” to be,
and the is by being Christian–
and you can only be Christian
by adopting the doctrines
of the Christian religion as your own.
What that has to do with life,
much less “abundant life,”
is shifted to “heaven,”
where everyone will “really live”
after they really die,
which is how Christians base their case
for making everybody Christians.
It is ridiculous to suppose
that Jesus came to start a church
with doctrines and theology,
creeds and catechisms and ideology
as the way to life.
Jesus didn’t tell anybody what to think.
He told people what to do:
Be a neighbor!
Love one another as you love yourself!
Love your enemies!
Help those who need to be helped!
Be generous, kind, compassionate
and true to yourself!
He said in 10,000 ways,
“It doesn’t matter what you believe!
It matters what you do and how you do it!”
And,
“Believe whatever it takes
to do what needs you to do it
the way it needs to be done!”
That’s the way to having life,
and having it abundantly–
doing what needs us to do it,
the way it needs to be done:
with all our heart, and soul, and mind and strength–
in each situation as it arises,
all our life long.
04/18/2017 — It is too much to ask, or to expect,
of the church of our experience
that it transform itself
into the church as it ought to be,
but it might be replaced
by an organization
of psychological/spiritual
(And were does that line lie?)
gatherings for the purpose
of enhancing, enabling, encouraging
the self-development of persons
on all levels.
This would include life-long learning
in at least three areas:
Mindfulness Meditation and Practice
A Montessori-like approach
to life experience for children.
A Jungian-like approach
to life experience for youth/adults.
There would be a core element
of universally recognized truths
reflected in all three areas,
but no doctrine,
no theology,
no creed,
no ideology
beyond the emphasis
upon the individual’s experience
and expression of herself, of himself,
through all of the stages
of human development.
It is well past time
to begin implementing
this approach to life experience
for all people world wide.
04/10/2017— We need communities of innocence–
innocent in the sense of having
nothing at stake in us,
and no interest in using us
to its advantage,
or enhancing itself
at our expense–
to help us live grounded
in the truth of who we are,
trusting the truth of our own
life experience,
the strength, wisdom and intelligence
of our creative imagination,
and the sustaining, guiding, presence
of the Invisible Other within.
Those communities are composed
of people like us,
seeking to find their life and live it
within the conditions and circumstances
of their life,
in accord with themselves
and their life,
and in service to the gifts that are theirs
to share as a boon for all.
We live together
in a “One for all, all for one”
kind of way–
individuals served by the collective
for the good of the whole.
It is simple enough
that a child can grasp it,
and difficult enough
to bring grown people to tears.

Our circumstances grow us up,
if we can grow up.
They are the only thing that can.
When we run from our circumstances,
deny our circumstances,
hate our circumstances,
blame our circumstances
for all that is wrong about us and our life,
we refuse the gauntlet
that stands between us
and all that we are capable
of being and becoming,
and settle into the slow rot
of discontent
and terminal resentment
over the sorry lot we were given–
never getting beyond
the poor-me-why-me stage
of development,
which is to say that
we never develop at all.

04/19/2017— What makes Trump great
in Republican eyes
is that things would be
soooooo much worse
if Democrats were in control.
Trump could do anything
(and will)–
it won’t matter.
Democrats would be worse by far.
That’s the reasoning
that keeps the terrible mess in place.
It isn’t as bad as it could be.
We are dealing with people
who are irrational,
illogical
and beyond reason.
Yet, they make perfectly good sense
once we realize they are crazy.

04/19/2017 — “Growing up” means
placing ourselves in accord
with our life
and placing ourselves in accord
with ourselves.
“Growing up” is being in accord
with our life and with ourselves.
“That we might grow up”
is the sole meaning of life,
and the whole purpose
of our existence.
It is why we are here.

Our life experience provides us with all we need
for the reflection required
to form new realizations
and transform our life,
creating different life experience
resulting in additional reflection,
generating further realization
producing an increasing variation of life experience.
We change our world,
and impact THE world
by the quality
of our relationship
with our life experience.
Our life experience is the matrix of creation
unfolding,
ongoing,

We have all the tools we need
to be the agent of change
and transformation
our life needs us to be.
We only have to practice
the mindful art
of sitting quietly,
holding everything in awareness,
and watching for the shifts to happen.
So simple a child could do it.
And so the saying,
“Unless you turn and become as children,
you will never enter the kingdom of heaven
(which is the realization and service of life
here and now
upon the earth
of our days and nights).”

04/20/2017 — The Aristocracy has no business
tending the affairs of the people,
yet, the people, enamored
by the Aristocracy,
and vicariously lifted
to imaginary heights
through their identification
with the Aristocracy
as “MY President,”
are glad to hand the responsibility
for their own good
over to someone who
cares nothing for it–
and blame their loss of freedom
upon the enemies of the Aristocracy,
which the Aristocracy encourages,
by blaming its enemies
for every abuse of power
and failure to govern
in ways that serve the good of the people,
but increase its own fortune,
and guard its own interests.
An awake,
informed,
and politically involved population
is the only champion
democracy ever has.
04/20/2017 — Republicans think Trump is not
poisoning their water,
or pumping toxins
into their air.
Removing EPA protections
has nothing to do with their health
or that of their children.
Trump would not harm them,
and anyone else doesn’t matter.
Building detention centers
for undocumented immigrants
is no concern of theirs.
Restricting freedom for some
will have no impact
on the freedom of others–
particularly others like them.
Republicans are so innocent,
so trusting,
so complicit,
at fault,
and to blame.
04/20/2017 — Republicans in congress and in state legislatures
do not do a thing in the service
of the best interest of their constituents.
Republican politicians everywhere
live to serve,
not the people,
but their ideology–
no government large enough to interfere with
unrestricted profits for corporations and industry.
And in every election,
no Republican office-seeker
can point to the goods and services
he or she helped, or pledges, to effect
during his or her term of office,
because that is clearly not the case,
but can only promise
to not raise taxes.
Not raising taxes is the only thing
Republicans do.
They do it by reducing the goods and services
that are helpful to the people
(which they call “reducing the size of government”).
The declare themselves to be
the champions of the people,
when, in fact, they are the Liege Lords of the people,
profiting mightily from the vote of the people,
while the people trudge through their life
beneath the weight of their neglect and abuse,
thankful for their deliverance
from the hands of those who would
most certainly, absolutely, without question or doubt,
raise their taxes.

04/20/2017 — Donald Trump has failed
the American people
at every opportunity,
lost in the world
of making government
profitable to corporations–
to their owners and stockholders.
The people are an inconvenience.
He knows he has to make it appear
that he is trying to make them happy,
but, they do not make the top 100
in his list of priorities.

This is what Joseph Campbell said
about the funerals of those noble
in life and death during the Middle Ages:
There were recounted “the virtues
of loyalty and courage,
pride in the performance of duty,
and, for a king, his selfless,
fatherly care for his people’s good.”
Trump may aspire to nobility,
but he does not bring
one noble quality to the chase.

Trump spends millions on his
golf vacations at his own property,
which should cost nothing.
His joke of a wall will be a billion
(and counting) more,
and he has take away
rights, freedoms and protections
past counting.

The only thing Republicans can say
in his support is
“At least he isn’t Democrat,”
as though being a Democrat
is being Satan’s personal servant.
Ask them what they don’ like
about Democrats,
and they will say,
“Abortion, Gun Control, and Gay Marriage!”
And, if they were honest,
they would add
“Rights to women, blacks, LGBTQs, Muslims,
Latinos and immigrants.”
These are the causes and groups
Republicans hate most,
and hate Democrats for supporting.
And that will change not over time.

So, we don’t talk to Republicans.
We talk to those near-Republicans
who can hear what we have to say
about the value of human rights,
and the importance for governmental support
for people who need help
with finding their life and living it–
including education and worker-rights–
and the crucial necessity
environmental and financial protections
for all people,
in all times and places.

Ours is the task of keeping the focus
where the focus belongs
by remembering and being those
who live strong in the service of
the essential values at the heart
of being human,
“with liberty and justice for all.”

Sin is the refusal/failure to be who we
It has nothing to do with morality.
It has everything to do with courage
and identity,
and faithfulness to our Self–
the invisible Other whom Jung was talking about:
“There is in each of us,
another,
whom we do not know.”
Sin is knowing better than the Other knows
who and what and how
we are to be.
Arrogance and cowardliness
are the primary guises of sin,
but denial and rejection have their place as well.
And no one can save us
from the impact
of our failure/refusal
to be true to ourselves,
our Self at the center of ourselves.
What could possibly stand as recompense to our Self?
What could “make it up to” our Self
that we did not have what it takes
to live the life that is/was our joint venture?
A life unlived is a life forever unlived.
For. Ever. Un. Lived.
Who can make that right?
There is no forgiveness for our failure/refusal
to be who we are.
There is only BEING WHO WE ARE
now,
and in all the moments following this one.
Forever.
We have waited long enough.
And it is the role of both the church
and the government
to help us assume our role
and take up our task.
Helping the people find what they need
to be who they are
is the task of church and state.
We are not alone with the work of being human.
We need all of the help we can get.
Where are they?
Where have they been?
In becoming ourselves,
we have to insist on the help we have to have
from both church and state,
and refuse to take “No” for an answer.
This is the “three cord opera,”
the Holy Trinity,
the Triune Dialogue,
that comprises the rest of our life.
We have a part to play.
The church has a part to play.
The state has a part to play.
There can be no play without the players.
Open the curtains–
its Showtime!

04/21/2017 — When the world tilts on its axis,
and roles become not what they need to be–
when the cab drivers begin selling tacos,
and the dentists begin playing harps,
and the dancers begin building high rises,
and the president’s daughter begins acting
like a stand-in for her dad,
it becomes an essential requirement
for each of us to find
“the face that was ours before we were born,”
and be who we are.
04/21/2017 — All the fairy tales,
fables
and stories about
the hero’s journey
are filled with unpretentious
helpers and guides.
So is your life and mine.
We did not get here alone.
And we will not
progress beyond here alone.

The Psychopomp is a mythological guide
for souls to the place of the dead
past the trials and ordeals of the Underworld–
and can be understood
as any helper or guide who comes to our aid
on our journey to our Self
and the life that is our joint life to live
on this side of the grave.
There is a Psychopomp (or more)
for every developmental stage of life,
unrecognizable and unpredictable,
yet exactly what we need
at the time and place we need it.

Take the time
from time to time
to remember your Psychopomps,
and to recall the times
you have served others as a Psychopomp.
And celebrate the wonder
of how things work
in ways beyond imagining,
explaining,
or understanding

We live in the service of our identity–
we live to serve our identity–
we live to be who we are,
to express who we are,
exhibit who we are,
make known who we are.
If we don’t know who we are,
or don’t care who we are,
or never think about who we are–
engrossed as we are
in buying, spending, amassing, consuming
and immersing ourselves
in entertaining pastimes,
we live haunted by the sense
of something missing,
with no idea of what
it might be.

04/22/2017 — Our highest allegiance
belongs to our Self–
the one about whom Jung said,
“There lives in each of us,
another whom we do not know.”
It is our work to know
“whom we do not know,”
and to live a joint life
in collaboration with
the Other within–
being who we are
and who we also are.
Being true to ourselves–
both of them:
our conscious ego-self,
and the psyche-self
of whom we are unconscious–
bringing ourselves forth
in a manner appropriate to the occasion
in each situation as it arises,
for the good of each individual
and for the good of the whole.
It is a noble task
worthy of a god,
or those godlike enough
to be taken for a god.
That being the case,
why would we devote ourselves
to anything else?

Focus and concentration, Kid.
Focus and concentration.
Distractions abound.
If it doesn’t help us
realize,
reveal,
express,
exhibit,
manifest,
know and make known
who we are,
it is concealing,
obscuring,
denying,
suppressing,
repressing
who we are.
How clearly are you
coming forth in your life?
How are you helping
others come forth in their life?
If it isn’t revealing,
it is concealing.
Focus and concentration, Kid.
Focus and concentration.

(A note on the photograph—comparing this image with the one posted immediately prior to it gives you a “picture” of the difference two years makes. Ice storms and the weight of time and gravity took their toll with the loss of limbs and branches. My last visit, in 2013, shocked me with the degree of destruction since this photo was made, and I doubt that much of it remains by now.)

04/23/2017 — Hillary Clinton will always be
a ready diversion,
excuse,
and subject-shifter
Trump’s supporters use
to ignore his blatant obscenities.
“Hillary would be worse by far!”
“Hillary would have done the same!”
“At least he isn’t Hillary!”
Hillary is history.
Trump is present and unaccounted for.
And the future hangs
by a raveling thread.
If you are not against Trump,
you are with him.
And that is an indictment
without defense.

It is preferred
by those who
wish it were true.
Too many people
live in an Alt-universe,
one of their own making,
as though it is the real thing,
where climate change doesn’t happen,
and choices don’t have untoward consequences,
and we can make all the money we want
without paying any price,
or creating any resistance,
or worrying about Karma at all.
Alt-truth is a lie
and.
The truth will out.

We make up whatever we “take on faith.”
That being the case,
you might think
we would make up something
helpful to ourselves and others,
and not something harmful
to anyone.
But no.
We “take it on faith”
that God hates homosexuals,
for example (but the list is long),
and will send them all to hell,
and us with them
if we don’t hate them, too,
and make their life a living hell
on earth before they die.
We “take it on faith”
that if you don’t do it like we do,
we should punish you
to wake you up,
enlighten you as to
the error of your ways,
so that you might repent,
and become as we are.
We take the damnedest things “on faith.”
It used to be that we
“took it on faith”
that we were to sacrifice
our virgin daughters
and first born sons
to keep God on our side.
Why would we want to be
on the side of a God like that?
It’s time we stopped
taking just anything “on faith,”
and started being responsible
for the things we “take on faith,”
making sure they are good for everybody.
(That’s EVERYBODY!)
Things like science, for instance,
and mindfulness,
and art,
and music…

04/25/2017 — It comes down to

knowing who you are

and doing what is

yours to do.

Having something

to show for it

doesn’t enter into it.

Refusing,

or hiding from,

the responsibility

to know and to do

leaves us

with a lot of

time on our hands.
04/25/2017 —

The truth is the bed
you will sleep in tonight,
and the world
you will wake up to
in the morning.
The truth is who you are
and what you do–
and who you refuse,
or fail,
to be,
and what you refuse,
or fail,
to do.
We don’t define truth.
We live it.
We are the truth we seek.
We cannot help but live
truthful lives.
Whether we can face it
or not,
is another matter.

Who are we when nobody is watching?
How different is our Public Face
from our Private Face?
What are we hiding?
Why?
04/26/2017 — We are made up of
the I,
the Not I,
and the Also I.
It is the role of the I
(our conscious ego)
to get the I together
with the Also I
and to reduce the influence
of the Not I.
How much of our
Not I
is actually our
Also I?
How much of our I
is actually our Not I?
Where do those lines lie?
Finding them
and drawing them
and honoring/enforcing them
is our role
for the rest of our life.
04/26/2017 — I talked with a MRI technologist once who told me, “Jim, all the organs in our body, all the blood and muscles, are sending out different signals. We are a range of frequencies held together by a range of frequencies.”

Which led me to wonder in several directions at once.

Could we invent a weapon to jam or scramble a person’s frequencies, and kill people more efficiently than with bullets and bombs?

Could we invent a redemptive device to realign a person’s frequencies, and heal people of diseases? Cure people of emotional trauma? Turn our enemies into friends?

Could we learn to read, decipher, discern a person’s frequencies and know whether that person would be a good employer, employee, spouse/partner/friend?

Could it be that we already do something along these lines when we “resonate” with a particular person, place, or thing?

Does that which has always been called “God” have a certain frequency range? And could that be what we sense when we talk of “being in the center of God’s will,” or “being in the flow,” or “being with the Force,” or “being in the groove,” of “being at one with the Tao,” of “having Buddha mind.” of things “being harmonious,” of things “humming right along”?

Perhaps we should develop the field of Octave Medicine in addition to Nuclear Medicine, or Octave Therapy alongside Psychotherapy, transforming frequencies, changing lives.

The entire universe is a range of frequencies held together by a range of frequencies.

Is a frequency physical or spiritual? A wave or a particle?

Do ideas and dreams have frequencies separate from the frequencies of the person who “has” them?

When we “tune out” and “tune in,” are we changing frequencies?

That was a conversation worth the price of a cup of coffee.

04/27/2017— If we don’t have time to sit quietly
and be still,
we are doing too much.
All of our doing
must flow from,
and lead to,
our not-doing.
It is how much,
and how often,
we do nothing
that produces
the quality
and depth
of what we do.
We cannot do
until we are able
to do not
frequently
and well.

04/27/2017 — Drifting back to the idea that
we are a collection of frequencies
in search of a tuning fork,
I will point out that
Joseph Campbell said
()n the last page of the final chapter
of “The Power of Myth,”
the Bill Moyers’ interview on PBS
made into a book),
“When you realize the sound ‘AUM’
is the sound of the mystery
of the world everywhere,
you don’t have to go looking for it
because it is right here all around.
Just sit still and it,
and experience it,
and know it (or words to that effect).”
He follows that with:
“‘AUM’ is a word
that represents to our ears
the sound of the energy
of the universe
of which all things
are manifestations…
If you listen to Tibetan monks
chanting ‘AUM,’ you begin
to sense what that word means,
and perhaps resonate with the frequency
that vibrates eternally
through all things
(or words to that effect).”
We are never far
from that which we seek–
only a perception shift away
from making The Find,
and knowing
what we have always known.
04/28/2017— Wood Sorrel 2017 01 — 22 Acre Woods, Indian Land, South Carolina, April 16, 2017

Too many people think that
doing what they love to do
means doing what they like to do,
and they don’t do anything
they don’t like to do,
which means they don’t
do what they love.
Doing what we love to do
will grow us up
by requiring us to
do what we don’t like to do.
We will have to sacrifice everything
in the service of what we love.
Doing what we love
makes liege servants of us all.
We swear our allegiance,
fidellity
and loyalty
to the service of our love,
forsaking all other interests
and enthusiasms
for the sake of our heart’s
true devotion,
as long as life shall last.
We rise early,
and drive long distances,
and fight through large clouds of mosquitoes
to take a photograph of a sunrise
or something equally difficult
to justify.
It’s the Hero’s Journey,
lived gallantly for love.
If you don’t know
what I’m talking about,
I can’t explain it to you.

04/28/2017 — Alexis Carrel said “We cannot remake ourselves without suffering because we are the marble and the sculptor.”
We are the chisel and the stone.
The treasure and the dragon–
and the hero come to claim the boon.
We are the princess and the frog.
Beauty and the Beast.
Jekyll and Hyde.
The light and the shadow…
It’s time we realized
the truth of the matter
and called a parley.
We have to talk.
We all have to talk.
All of us have to talk.
It out.
It through.
It over.
How can we all work together
for the good of the whole?
How can we take the interests
of all sides
into consideration?
Use the assets of all sides
in the work that needs us (all)
to do it?
How might we each
sacrifice ourselves
in the service of the ALL?
How might we each
honor the others
in gratitude and appreciation
for the gifts and strengths
they bring to life
that is ours to fashion,
the work that is ours to do?
As an individual,
we are a collective,
and listening
with understanding
and compassion
is required
for the integration
and integrity
of our disparate parts.

Look in the mirror!
That’s my best advice.
Mirrors are everywhere.
Everything about us is a mirror
reflecting us back to us
(and to anyone else
with eyes to see):
Our loves and our lovers,
our hates and our fears,
our likes and our dislikes,
our actions and our in-actions,
our dreams and our day-dreams,
our life and our other life
(the one we are living
and the one we are refusing to live)…
It is all “right there” before our eyes
at all times.
Are we looking,
is the question.
Are we mindfully aware
of what we look at,
is the more important question.
We are the answer to both questions.
Our life is trying
to get us together
with our other life–
showing us how things are,
calling us to realize
how things need to be,
wondering what it will take
to wake us up
and turn us around
so that we might
live at last
at one with ourselves.

04/29/2017 — Nothing is more important
than taking seriously
the fact
of the Other within us
“whom (said Carl Jung) we do not know.”
The Invisible Other,
of whom we are unconscious,
is the psychic core
of our existence,
the foundation
of our life and being–
who we are built to be–
“the face that was ours
before we were born.”
And it is our place
to learn the language
of the unconscious,
and to collaborate
with in living the life
that is ours together to live.
04/30/2017 — The Republican Party

All things come—
in their own time—
to those who
are quiet enough
long enough
often enough
mindfully enough.
We cannot
hope to be anything
until we can be quiet.

04/30/2017 — Climate change is not happening
because it would be
bad for business.
If we treat something
as though it is not happening
it will go away.
Except that Miami
will be under six feet of water.
And New York.
And by the time it goes away
everything else will be gone
as well.
04/30/2017 — What needs to happen
in a situation
takes precedent
over every other matter
in that situation.
To ignore the things
that cry out to be done
in the service of things
that enhance our own personal good,
or our idea of the good,
or the good of those we revere
or admire,
is to do grave
and irreparable
damage
to the essence
of life and being,
and creates
really bad karma.
04/302017 — I think it could be clinically established
that Trump is delusional
and lives in denial.
This has to be a mental gestalt
that is a threat
to our national security.
Who is responsible
for making that determination
and acting to protect the country
and the world?
What is the protocol here?
This is as non-partisan a problem
as we hope we will ever live to see.
04/30/2017 — There is some radical Christian extremism
inside of what would be The Wall.
They have bombed day care centers
and abortion clinics,
burned churches,
killed innocents…
How are we going to get them
outside The Wall
that is going to protect us all?
Who is “us”?
Nobody has ever said
who “us” is.
Everybody acts like it’s obvious.
It isn’t clear at all to me.
If we are going to build a wall,
we ought to at least
know who belongs inside.
What are the standards
for determining who is “us”?
How are we going to agree
as to what constitutes
an “us marker”?
And, once we know who “us” are,
how are we going to get
“them” to leave?

“What a slippery slope this is!”
“It is like a razor’s edge!”
We walk two paths at the same time.
One path is The Good Of Ourselves–
The Self of our conscious ego,
and The Self of our inner psyche
(of which we are mostly unconscious)–
and the other path is The Good Of The Whole.
We owe it to ourselves
to be the individual we are
in each situation as it arises.
AND we owe it to the whole–
the others in the situation,
and beyond the situation
to the all-ness of all
that is to be considered–
to be what the situation
needs us to be for its good
as well as for our own.
But, our good is often
in direct opposition
to the good of the situation,
and the good of the situation
is often in direct opposition
to the good of all
that is beyond the situation.
So, whose good do we serve
in any situation?
How much for me?
How much for you?
How much for the rest of them?
Whose good is served
by the good we call good
in each situation as it arises?
And how good is that good
when it is served at the expense
of the others’ bad?
And how good is refusing
to serve someone’s good
because “it wouldn’t be fair”
to the others?
“To do or to do not,
when, where, why and how?”
is the question.
And answering the question
is the sheerest agony
in the experience of being human,
and the one that must be paid,
again and again,
in being human.
“Working it out,”
how much for me,
how much for you,
how much for them,
in each situation,
is the work of being human.
The Hero’s Journey–
which no hero manages
in a spirit of triumph and glory.
Jesus on the cross
is the image
of every hero
at the end of the Journey.
If you don’t understand that,
you have no business
wearing a cross
or talking about
“what Jesus did for us.”
What Jesus did
has to be done
by each of us
in each situation as it arises,
all our life long.

05/01/2017 — We need two countries with open borders
so that those who can’t
make up their minds
can move back and forth.
Or better, we need to issue
Red and Blue Cards
and create two governing bodies.
They could share the White House,
each working every other week.
Actually, the one that is “working” now,
could just work every four years,
maybe longer.
No one on their side
would notice if they never worked at all.

05/02/2017— A Walk in the Woods 2016 12 — 22 Acre Woods, Indian Land, South Carolina, November 14, 2016

We are defined
by our options and choices.
We would be different
with different options,
or different choices.
We would certainly be different
with better options
and better choices.

We don’t get to choose our choices.
The options we get
to choose from
are determined,
in part,
by the choices we have made.
The choices we will make
will tell the tale
that remains to be told.
What guides our boat
on its path through the sea?
What leads us to make
the choices we make?
What part do fear and desire
play in shaping our life?
How free are we
to choose the choice
that needs to be chosen?
How aware are we of
“the needs to be”?
How much are we controlled by
“the want to be” or
“the has to be”?
How strong is our sense of
what needs to be done,
or or what needs us to do it?
What is the difference
in terms of its impact
on our body
between what has to be done
and what needs us to do it?
How free are we to choose
the choices we make?
In light of what do we choose?
In light of what do we live?
How we answer the questions
will tell the tale
that remains to be told.

05/02/2017 — Your relationship with yourself
and your life
is your primary relationship.
Everything else falls into place
around that.
The quality of your life
is a reflection of the quality
of your relationship
with yourself and your life.
Self and Life are one thing.
The better the alignment,
so that Life reflects,
expresses,
exhibits,
displays,
IS
Self–
In Gerad Manley Hopkins’:
“What I do is me,
for that I came”–
the greater the blessing
for ourselves
and the world around us.

We all have our own burdens.
Bear the pain, I say.
There is no greater honor,
no greater necessity,
than bearing the pain
of our own burdens.
There is no greater joy.
“For the joy of what was sat before him…”
Goes the old text,
“…he endured the cross…”
Christians through the centuries
have missed the meaning
of the words.
“…scorning its shame,
and is seated at the
right hand of God.”
As though the “joy of the cross”
was “heaven on the other side,
seated at the right hand of God.”
Nothing could be further from the truth.
The joy of our pain,
of our burdens,
is the experience of our pain,
of our burdens.
Is. One. Thing.
Bittersweet.
Life is pain.
Is joy.
All at once.
Oxymoron all the way.
Truth is an oxymoron.
The truth that sets us free
is an oxymoron.
Darkness/light is one thing.
Understanding
is understanding
that we do not understand.
Seeing is seeing
that we do not see.
The Gateless Gate
stands open/shut
before us all
at every turn,
particularly at the point
of the joy of our burdens/
the burden of our joy.
The burdens of life
is the joy of life, living, being alive.
There is no life removed
from the burdens of living.
Bearing the pain
with understanding,
realization,
compassion,
acceptance,
and joy
does not remove the pain.
It bears the pain well.
Bear your pain well.
Carry lightly the burdens
of your life.
And laugh at every opportunity
along the way.

Money requires a place to put it
and something to buy with it.
Money isn’t everything.
Everything hangs by a thin thread.
Everything depends on
such a few things–
Mutual Respect,
Honesty,
Self-transparency,
Compassion,
Mindfulness,
..
Integrity is living in ways
that are integral
with who we are,
with what is
deepest,
best,
and truest
about us.
Money cannot buy integrity,
but it does,
just about every time.

05/04/2017 — Here’s my take on abortion.
1) EVERYBODY BACK UP!
2) This isn’t like setting a speed limit.
3) There are women right now who are pregnant and cannot carry their pregnancy to term.
4) NOBODY–NOT EVEN GOD!–has the right to force a woman to be pregnant!
5) EVEN GOD asked Mary’s permission to bring Bebe Jesus into the world.
6) EVERYBODY MIND YOUR OWN BUSINESS!
7) EVERYBODY support an environment supportive of everybody’s right to conduct their own affairs in a way that they determine needs to be done!
8) Do not make laws that are burdensome to some people because of the religious scruples of other people!
9) Make sure your business is not tending other people’s business!

05/04/2017 — I am dumbfounded
by Republicans
who want a job
they don’t want to do.

05/04/2017 — The people who vote
for Republicans
have never been helped
by Republicans.
They have been helped
by Democrats
who Republicans say
are Evil incarnate.
They hate Democrats
who help them,
and love Republicans
who have never helped them.
And you won’t live long enough
to see them change their mind.
05/05/2017 — What people who like Donald Trump
like about Donald Trump
is that he doesn’t give a damn.
They don’t get
that he doesn’t give a damn
about them.
They think he only
doesn’t give a damn
about the people
they don’t give a damn about.
As the realization slowly dawns,
it comes as shock, betrayal, disbelief and rage.
He. Doesn’t. Give. A. Damn.
He. Is. Incapable. Of. Compassion.
It. Is. All. About. Getting. What. He. Wants.
Publicity. Money. Fame. Glory. Attention. Attention. Attention.
Donald Trump tells his people
what they want to hear
and treats them like
they are dust in the wind,
and they love it
because they believe he is
who they believe he is.
Co-dependency gone to the extreme.
They have to have a Savior.
He has to be The Savior Of Saviors.
It is a marriage made for hell–
which is how the rest of us experience it.
05/05/2017 — Democrats and Republicans
speak nonsense to each other.
AM talking to FM.
Words conveying values and perspectives
beyond the others’ experience
and ability to understand.
Heads banging into walls,
together the way ice cubes
are together
in the same refrigerator.
We are two countries
pretending to be
“the United States of America,”
with nothing united about us.
05/05/2017 — Here’s my take on abortion.
1) EVERYBODY BACK UP!
2) This isn’t like setting a speed limit.
3) There are women right now who are pregnant and cannot carry their pregnancy to term.
4) NOBODY–NOT EVEN GOD!–has the right to force a woman to be pregnant!
5) EVEN GOD asked Mary’s permission to bring Bebe Jesus into the world.
6) EVERYBODY MIND YOUR OWN BUSINESS!
7) EVERYBODY support an environment supportive of everybody’s right to conduct their own affairs in a way that they determine needs to be done!
8) Do not make laws that are burdensome to some people because of the religious scruples of other people!
9) Make sure your business is not tending other people’s business!

05/05/2017 — People who have scruples against abortion don’t want any of their taxes paying for abortions, even of pregnancies caused by incest or rape, or those which threaten the mother’s life.
I have scruples against a border wall and a nuclear arsenal a thousand times larger than necessary to obliterate the world, and don’t want my taxes going toward paying for them.
How do anti-abortion scruples get a platform and politicians rallying around them, and anti-wall and anti-nuclear arsenal beyond all reason scruples get dismissed as ridiculous and absurd?

It has taken all these years
to understand that life is about
growing up,
paying attention,
being mindful,
seeing what we look at,
hearing what we listen to,
perceiving what is before us,
receiving what is given to us,
responding to life-in-the-moment-of-our-living
out of our integrity-of-being
by being what the moment needs us to be
in ways that express
and exhibit
who we are and what is ours to give.
We rise to every occasion
in this way,
forcing nothing,
imposing nothing,
demanding nothing,
insisting on nothing,
simply seeing/being/doing/living
in ways that are appropriate
to the occasion
in every occasion–
realizing depths about ourselves
we have no idea are there,
and would never know
without being pulled beyond ourselves
in each moment
by the circumstances of our life
which have come to us
to show us who we are
and grow us up
into who we are capable of becoming.

Each one of us was an extension of the whole lot of us.
We were identified with,
and by,
the tribe of our origin.

For over 10,000 years, Native American tribesmen
made arrowheads that were exact duplicates
because no variation was allowed.
The way to make arrowheads
was prescribed by the Ancestors
from the beginning.
And as with arrowheads,
so with every other aspect of tribal life.
No one though for himself, for herself.
Everyone did it like it was supposed to be done.
No improvements were permitted.
None were even imagined.
The slightest deviation
was proven to unleash
the punishment of the gods.

Even now, in some places of the world,
people are told to rid themselves
of their egos
and let The Way of the Ancestors (or Gurus)
lead them through their life.

The story of human evolution
is the story of coming to consciousness,
the story of waking up the individual within
so that we each stand apart
from the Tribal Whole of our origin,
and say, “NO! MY do it!”
The story of human evolution
is the long tale
of our individuality,
our individuation,
coming forth,
taking hold.

The Hero’s Journey is the trek to ME,
to I AM!
It is made tricky by having to take the needs
of everyone else into account.
The society,
the State,
has a claim upon the individuals
making up the society,
the State.
And our life is lived on two paths
at the same time.
We have to be true to ourselves
and we have to submit
to the requirements of life in the culture
of our origin.
This is the gauntlet
we must pass through
on our way to being fully human.
This is the Hero’s Journey,
working it out between
the ME and the WE.

05/06/2017 — My Take On Abortion, Part 2
If I have a stroke that leaves me with zero brain wave activity, most of the thinking, reasoning, rational, logical population of the world would not think that I am alive.
The Catholic Church can say that I am alive, and all of the Evangelical Christian churches can chime in on the chorus, “That Jim is alive! Oh, he is so alive! He will order off the menu any minute now!” but the rest of us know I am not alive, and will be fed by a feeding tube unless some good soul unhooks me from all life-sustaining devices, an act for which no person described so astutely in the first paragraph upon doing would be called a “Murderer!” or “Killer!”
Flash back in time to my mother’s womb with me attached to all of those life-sustaining devices through one umbilical tube. Up until about the 23rd week of her pregnancy I have no brain wave activity. I am no more alive then than I am hooked up to some mechanical mother in some emergency room somewhere.

23 weeks is a bit over 5 months.
The only difference between Jim then and Jim with a stroke now is that then Jim had more potential for life than Jim with a stroke now has. But. Potential for life is not life as we understand being alive. And. If someone is going to make a case for me being alive based on my potential for life, then we all have to go Full Catholic Monty and say that to interfere with Jim’s conception is murder because preventing an egg’s chances of getting together with a sperm cell is sharply reducing Jim’s chances of being alive and is murder In Utero as surely as an abortion would be fifteen minutes or two days later.
And no person described so astutely in the first paragraph would be guilty of thinking that.

05/06/2017 — Follow the symptoms!
They will lead you to the truth!
To the perpetrators!
The predators!
The abusers!
The bullies!
The self-righteous sources
of the pain their family bears.
The controlling manipulators
and white-gloved curators
of hell-on-earth,
disguised as angels of light
and oblivious to the damage
they do.
Symptoms read well
tell stories
grown men and women
cannot hear told.
All of the ills that plague humanity
can be traced
to the untold stories
of symptoms dismissed and denied.

05/06/2017 — The most heroic decision/act/deed
ever made or done
is getting up
and doing the thing
that needs to be done–
that needs us to do it–
the thing that we most do not
want to do.
That is the deed
that transforms the world
and saves the day
for countless days to come.

05/06/2017 — The next time you have nothing to do,
with no pressing urgencies to attend,
and no guiding passions to follow,
simply sit quietly
and be mindful of the moment
on all levels.
Consciousness evolves by being conscious.
We grow from one realization to another
through reflecting on our experience,
and holding all things together
in our awareness.
Shifts in perspective happen that way.
And nothing is the same ever after.

05/06/2017 — Being aware of things as they are
changes our relationship with them,
which changes things as they are,
but not necessarily in the way
we would like for them to change.
Being aware of how we would like
things to be
changes how we would like
things to be.
Awareness changes things,
but not according to our plans
and agenda.
Our plans and agenda
are among the things changed.
When we realize how much
we want changed about our life
requires us to change,
we change our minds
about wanting things
to be different.
We want things to be different
with everything else
staying the same.
05/06/2017 — How can Chechnya’s treatment of gays go
without being denounced?
Without sanctions being imposed?
Without outcry and opposition?
Will witch hunts,
drowning’s,
and burnings at the stake
be next?
How does inhumanity
take over
and flaunt its insanity?

The heart of the matter
is how we treat the people
we don’t like–
how we treat the people
who are not like us.
Brutality and ruthlessness
have no place at the table.
Enjoyment in inflicting
pain, suffering and death
is inhumanity at its worst–
and shines through
the shiniest facades,
tarnishing the legacy
of the time and place
of its expression
over all time forever.
Incivility calls out the pretense
of “civilization,”
and reveals the truth
of barbaric evil
at the gates
of every age.
It comes down to
each person doing the work
of being human–
living to serve and express
the best we are capable of
through all of the conditions
and circumstances
of our life.
The obligation
to Be Human First
falls upon us all,
particularly upon those in power,
with the authority and means
to lead toward the good
and away from evil
in each generation.
How well do we treat the people
we don’t like?
How well do we treat the people
who are not like us?
Civilization stands or falls
on our answers to these questions.

05/07/2017 — Perspective determines perception.
How we see determines what we see.
We will see what we have always seen
until we change the way we look at it.
If we are unwilling to see things differently
everything will be what it has been
forever.
Gays.
Blacks.
Hispanics.
Muslims.
Women.
Immigrants.
The Poor.
The Disabled.
…
A new world begins with new ways of seeing the old one.

05/07/2017 — Hillary Clinton and Joe Biden have slammed Trump in the past couple of weeks for being silent on Chechnya’s brutalization of gays. That’s two Democrat voices. And there have been others as well. Where are the Republican voices?

Who on the Republican side of the isle speaks for the disenfranchised, the marginalized, the fringe dwellers, the voiceless, the powerless, the ones of every nation who are like “a root out of dry ground” to the privileged and wealthy beyond imagining.
05/07/2017 — Our life is always waiting
for us to live it.
The good news about that
is that we don’t have to
think up what to do.
It is not on us.
The burden is not ours
to conceive and to do.
Our place is simply
that of listening.
We listen with our body.
It is like falling in love.
What knows first?
Not our head!
Our body knows.
When we tune into our body,
so that we know what it knows,
we know all we need to know
to do the thing that needs
us to do it now.
We don’t have to know why.
We only have to know what.
And do it.
Without knowing were it will lead,
or what will happen next,
or how we can explain
what we are doing
in order to justify/excuse/defend it
in someone else’s eyes,
or even our own.
Our life unfolds one choice at a time.
Listening for
and knowing what
needs us to do it now
in each now that comes along
adds up to a life well-lived
over time.
It is in looking back
and following the thread to here
that we get a sense
of movement and flow,
and direction, purpose and meaning.
We find our life in living it.
Head figuring out what body knows.

05/07/2017 — I operate out of a number
of mindsets,
of mental/emotional
(And were does that line lie?)
states of being.
I spend most of my driving time
on back roads and residential streets
with speed limits between 35 and 45.
The back roads occasionally merge
with interstate highways
with speed limits at 70
and real time traffic speed at 80 or so.
It helps to be ready to make the shift.
Back road mentality
will get you killed on the interstate.
Our mental state has to match
our physical circumstances.
Mindful awareness enables
smooth transitions.
Knowing what I am doing
and what that calls for
in terms of presence and attention
makes all the difference
in my being able
to plug into the situation
and be what it is needed.
When I’m cooking,
it matters if I am fully there,
present,
cooking.
I cannot grocery shop
and chat with anybody.
When I’m reading,
I have to read.
When I’m writing,
I have to write.
My mindset has to be
engaged with whatever
I’m doing.
There is no multitasking
on the freeways of life.

05/07/2017 — Free will is a joke
calling up peals of regaling laughter
from those smitten by True Love.
There is nothing free about being in love.
“Doing whatever I want to do”
is out of the question.
We are not free to choose our wants.
Our wants are thrust upon us
by forces beyond our control.
That is the motivation
that moves us to action!
It comes from somewhere
other than us.
We don’t do it.
We couldn’t conjure it up
any more than we could
decide what we will dream tonight.
We are not free to will
any of the important things.
Or we can will them
without effect.
The best we can hope for
is to surrender to the smite
when smitten,
and follow willingly
(not willfully)
along the way.
This is the relationship
of moved with mover,
experienced in the arms of a lover,
but also in the devotion,
loyalty, allegiance and duty
to our life’s calling
and our heart’s true work.
The urgency of an urge unbidden
stirs us to life
and leads us through life
as those who belong to another
“whom we do not know.”

We are the shepherd and the sheep.
How we relate to ourselves
makes all the difference.
We waste our time
looking for in others
what is found within.
All the time,
we are what
we are looking for.
We reject,
ignore,
dismiss,
discount,
despise
the treasure we seek.
The stone the builders reject,
is the pearl of great price,
overlooked again and again
by those who are like sheep
without a shepherd,
spending their days
waiting for Godot.

05/08/2016 — There is a percentage of gay people in every population over time.
And a percentage of transgender people.
And a percentage of Down syndrome people.
And a percentage of people over 6 feet tall.
And a percentage of people under 4 feet tall.
And a percentage of people who are left-handed.
And a percentage of people with green eyes.
And a percentage of people with red hair.
And a percentage of people with green eyes and red hair.
And on it goes…
There is even a percentage of people in every population
who think they are normal.
And a percentage of people who think that being “normal”
makes them somehow “better”
and “more like you ought to be”
than anyone else.
And a percentage of people who treat everyone
not like they are
as though they don’t belong
and have no business being alive.
There is a bell-shaped curve
(That would be a “normal distribution” curve–
the ONLY normal thing about the species
is the WIDE DISTRIBUTION
of characteristics,
traits,
tics,
and proclivities
that reside in every population
in every generation
in every age)
for every possible condition of life.
So what?
We all have to do the best we can
with what we have to work with,
and we all need all the help we can get.
So what’s with not being helpful,
across the board, around the table
and around the world?

05/08/2017 — How can every Republican office holder–and by extension everyone who voted for them–have no interest in, or concern for, the well-being of all people (And nothing but disdain and contempt for those who need help the most)?

And if they say, “Oh, we care!” where is the evidence? If people cannot see any difference between being cared for and being despised, they may as well be despised–as they, in fact, are.

05/08/2017 — A church that offers scriptural proofs
of the validity of its doctrine
and scriptural support
for the value of its political ideology
(And to say, “God isn’t a Democrat or a Republican,”
begs the question,
“Who would God have you vote for?”
And God would always have us vote for
the politician who best espouses
our political ideology
which we support with
scriptural references),
is a church that is behind the times,
preaching a sermon
with no referents in a world
that knows more than the Bible knows
about all of the things–
social, cultural, medical, scientific and religious–
the Bible is said to have the last word on.
For the church to have
foundational place in this world,
and a salvific impact upon it,
it must focus its efforts
on creating an environment
that fosters individual reflection,
examination,
exploration,
realization,
expression
and maturation–
providing the ground
for an experience of God
that serves the individual
as a guiding impulse
and a supporting presence
in the work of finding
and living
the life that is best suited
to bring forth the unique gifts
and qualities
that are her, or his,
physical manifestations
of her, or his,
spiritual essence.
That would be a church
worthy of our time
and commitment.

05/08/2017 — If I were to help you
connect with yourself,
I would ask you
to become mindfully aware
(Google Jon Kabat-Zinn
and watch all of his YouTube videos)
of all that works
to disconnect you from yourself,
and then I would leave the room.
You could take it from there.

See how long you can sit quietly.
No music.
No TV.
No conversation.
No writing.
No reading.
Just you and the silence.
Just you paying attention
to the silence.
Just you watching and listening
to what happens
in the silence.
What do you think?
Where do your thoughts go?
What do you feel?
Where do your feelings come from?
What are you aware of?
What is your level of comfort
with what you are doing?
What causes you to break it off?
How long did you last?
Repeat the experiment
once a day
for a month.

05/09/2017 — We don’t know how bad things will get
but.
The Silence is the source
of all that we need
to find what we need,
If.
We approach it
with a Noble Heart.
A Noble Heart is
a Kind Heart,
a Brave Heart,
a Faithful Heart,
a Loyal Heart,
a Compassionate Heart,
a Patient Heart,
a Generous Heart,
a Tender Heart,
a Courageous Heart,
a Perceptive Heart,
a Gallant Heart,
a Heart that is Transparent to itself,
a Heart that Knows itself,
a Heart that Keeps Faith with itself,
a Heart that Keeps Company with itself,
a Heart that is at home with the Silence.
The eyes and ears of a Noble Heart
see and hear what is happening
and what the Silence has to say
about what is happening.
A Noble Heart takes its direction,
not from what is happening,
but from what the Silence has to say
about what is happening.
From the perspective of a Noble Heart
we have the right frame of mind
to deal with all that comes our way.
As we wait to see how things
will fall out,
we can do no better than spend the time
developing a Noble Heart,
and learning to listen to the Silence
and to see what we find there
with the ears and eyes of that Heart.
And all will be truly well
no matter how bad it gets.

What exciting times we live in.
Everything is on the line.
Everybody has to declare who they are
and what is important to them.
Everybody has to be known
for what they stand for.
No one gets a choice in the matter
of having to choose.
Everybody has to make a choice
among those offered:
For Democracy or against Democracy?
For Justice or against Justice?
For Transparency or against Transparency?
For Equal Rights or against Equal Rights?
For the Constitution or against the Constitution?
For the Truth The Whole Truth And NOTHING BUT THE TRUTH
or against everything that has the odor of TRUTH about it?

05/10/2017 — There is only one sin.
Not knowing what we are doing.
Which is the same
as thinking we know what we are doing.
Hubris,
Pride,
Arrogance
thinks it knows,
but doesn’t know what it knows,
and doesn’t know what
it doesn’t know.
Not knowing what we are doing
is the same thing
as not knowing who we are.
If we know what we are doing,
we know who we are.
We are the person who does _____.
We are what we do.
And what we do not.
There is no being
apart from doing.
We are brought forth in,
made apparent in,
given shape and form in
realized in,
expressed in,
exhibited in,
acted out in,
what we do with our life.
Our shame is our failure
to live up to what we are capable
of doing–
who we are capable of being.
Of not knowing what we are doing
or of what all we might be able to do.
We box ourselves into a life
that doesn’t fit us.
And think it is the best we can do.
We owe it to ourselves
to find out
if what we think is so.

There are two kinds of religion:
good and bad.
Good religion speaks to our heart,
bad religion speaks to our head.
Good religion springs from what we know,
bad religion springs from what we think.
Good religion connects us with all people everywhere.
bad religion creates division, alienation, estrangement.
Good religion resonates with us,
bad religion has to convert us.
Good religion elicits an immediate “Yes!”
bad religion has to overcome automatic “No!”
Good religion is content with how things are,
bad religion concentrates on how things ought to be.
Good religion talks about what is good,
bad religion talks about what is bad.
Good religion just walks away from bad religion,
bad religion has to persecute and destroy good religion.
How good is the religion we call good?
How bad is the religion we call bad?
How bad is the religion we call good?
How good is the religion we call bad?
Questions never asked in Sunday School.
Or in Seminary.

We are the source
of our own stability.
We have to be able
to center,
ground,
establish
ourselves
on the bedrock
of our core identity,
and stand on the values
principles,
ideals
and character
which exhibit the heart/soul
of our deepest,
best,
truest,

What is unmoving
and unmovable
about us?
Solidly,
dependably,
reliably
US?
Go there!
Be that!
In season
and out of season,
in every situation,
in all circumstances
throughout the time
that is left to us.
And if you don’t have
any idea of what
I am talking about,
begin taking a
Me/Not Me inventory.
Ask of every choice,
option,
decision
that comes your way:
“Is this ME or NOT ME?”
And listen in the silence
of not-knowing,
of being unsure
about the answer,
for “the still small voice”
of YOU
to guide the way.

If you vote Republican,
you are saying
you like the way Republicans
treat women,
and gay people,
and transgender people,
and black people,
and poor people,
and people with special needs,
and Muslims,
and Latinos,
and immigrants,
and you are cheering them on,
never minding that Jesus said,
“In as much as you have done it,
or not done it,
to the very least
of my brothers and sisters,
you have done it,
or not done it,
unto me.”
Stop spitting on Jesus!
Stop voting for
and supporting Republicans!
Demand that they take up the cause
of those they are spitting on!
And become yourself
the advocate
of those who have no voice–
speaking for those
who are ignored,
dismissed
and abandoned
when they cry out
and there is no one who cares
what happens to them!
How you live every day
has an impact upon
how life is lived around you
and around the world.
Start living for the good
of people you don’t know!
And vote for people
who will do the same!

Awareness is our only weapon.
Awareness is the Elder Wand.
Seeing/hearing,
knowing/understanding,
are the ground and foundation
of doing/being.
Mindfulness leads the way.

Joseph Campbell said
the idea is to live to be in,
and live out of,
“a zone to which tracks do not lead,
only a spiritual leap” will suffice
(or words to that effect).

The “leap of faith,”
is not as we have been told,
a “leap” from a rational,
logical,
factual orientation
to a belief in what we are told
to believe
in spite of its incomprehensibility
from the standpoint
of all we know about
the difference between
sense and nonsense
(The Fall, Sacrifice, Redemption
and Salvation
as proclaimed by The Church),
but the “leap” from
“head-knowing” to
“heart-knowing.”

Carl Jung said,
“Most of our difficulties
come from losing contact
with our instincts,
with the age-old forgotten wisdom
stored up in us.”
Knowing what we know
on all levels
is knowing at its best,
and leads the way
through the deepest darkness
for those willing
to risk everything
in trusting what we know
to the exclusion of what we think.

“What a dangerous path this is!
It is a slippery slope!
Like the edge of a razor!”
The Hero’s Journey.

05/14/2017 — We want someone
to make it all better.
We can make it instantly
all better
just by changing
the way we look at it.
We are never more
than a perspective shift away
from better.
See how many different
ways you can see
what you look at.
See which way
works the best
for you
and the situation
as a whole.
Choose that one.

The only reality that matters right now
is the moment of our being–
our being in the moment of our living–
which includes our being open
to our needs of the moment
along with the needs of all the others
in the moment with us.
Then,
what to do about it?

05/15/2017 — We have to experiment with our life–
play with our life–
in order to discover
what is Me and Not Me.
We do not find our way
to the life
that is our life to live
by thinking about it.
We live our way there
by making wrong turns
and mindless choices
and waking ourselves up
and paying attention
to where we belong
and where we have
no business being,
and what we do
that is life,
and what we do
that is death,
and die to live
rather than
living to die.

Integrity is the highest value.
The primary goal.
The whole point.
The only reason we do it.
Integrity has nothing to do
with being aligned
with someone else’s idea–
some cultural or religious
standard, say–
of how it is to be done.
It has only to do with
being aligned with–
being at one with–
the unconscious
(because we are not conscious of it)
truth of who we are
at the bedrock level
of our own heart and soul.
It is what Jesus meant
when he said,
“The Father and I are one.”
Our experience
of our Bedrock Self
is what has always
been said to be “of God.”
“God” is who we are
capable of being–
who we ARE being–
when we are living
in ways that are integral
with who we
at the level
of our Bedrock Self.
It is what Rumi had in mind
when he said,
“One glimpse of a true human being
and we are in love.”
Because a true human being,
at one with “the Father,”
shows us who we
are capable of being,
and we see in her,
in him,
who we are,
and know it at the deepest level,
and fall in love–
not with her or him–
but with the idea of ourselves
that has yet to be realized
in the world of normal,
apparent,
reality–
but exists as a potential
for us all
throughout the time
left for living.
Mindfulness leads the way.
Integrity is the goal.
The Hero’s Journey.
To the heart of who we are.
Waiting for us even now.

05/16/2017 — Our life consists of distractions.
Everything there is there
to take our mind off
what we are there to do:
To bring ourselves forth,
utilizing the gifts,
the art,
that is ours to use
in the service of self expression,
as we tend the developmental tasks,
and incarnate or inner self
in ways appropriate to the occasion.
The condition and circumstances
of our life
constitute the matrix
with which,
and within which,
we work to produce ourselves.
We become who we are
by coming up against
the contemporary manifestations
of the Cyclops (and all of his friends)
as we go about the business
of body AND soul–
working out the ratios
between the two
that are one.
But then come the distractions
(the Cyclops’ favorite form)–
entertaining pastimes,
duties and obligations,
responsibilities and commitments–
and we lose the way,
wander off the path,
become untracked
and settle for
just getting through the day.
We have to transcend
the distractions,
holding them in our awareness
as part of the conditions and circumstances
within which we become who we are
by remembering what we are here to do
and doing it.

We have to give ourselves
to the developmental tasks–
to the tasks of life–
appropriate to
each stage of development
from birth to death.
“There is a time
for every purpose under heaven,”
and we are servants
of the time
that is upon us
at any period in our life.
The requirements
and obligations of life
are different at 75
than at 6 months.
We cannot live as though
we are 15
or 18
or 25

Yet, we are forever
ignoring,
denying,
dismissing,
disregarding,
discarding,
declining
eschewing,
renouncing,
shunning,
evading,
ostracizing,
and refusing
the things that are incumbent
upon us in the
time and place of our living.
Star Wars was written
and produced
with 12-year-olds in mind.
If we miss the path
when we are 12,
we do not outlive
its attraction when we are 70,
but we have to know
what we are missing
and how to incorporate it
into our life here and now.
We cannot just watch a movie.
And watching a movie
keeps us from thinking about
what we need to be thinking about
as 70-year-olds.
Getting behind
in the developmental tasks
means we miss
something crucial
either then or now.

05/17/2017 — Truth requires justice.
Justice demands truth.
Some lies beg to be exposed.
Some lies serve a truth beyond the question.
All lies lead to truth and justice.
The point cannot be explained,
only experienced.
Seeing is a matter of looking
to the point of transcendence.
“Aha!” awaits further reflection.
Truth is willing out
all of the time.
05/17/2017— The Voice of Authority
would be exactly whose voice?
Who guides your boat
on its path through the sea?
Who decides what you will do?
Where you will go?
How you will spend your time?
What is the source
of your motivation and direction?
How do you know
that what you are doing
is the right thing to do–
is the right thing for YOU to do?
Is right for YOU?
The Dangerous Path,
the Slippery Slope,
the Razor’s Edge
is the boundary line
between our Conscious Ego
and our Unconscious Impulses,
Instincts, Intuition and
all that is involved in that mystical term
“Resonance.”
Something “resonates” with us,
or does not at all.
And we read that with our
Conscious Ego,
or not,
and decide what to do about it,
or not.
But.
It is essential that the Conscious Ego
“wear the pants”
in its relationship with the Unconscious components.
WE are the Authority over our life!
WE guide our boat on its path through the sea–
in collaboration with the Unconscious
and all it has to offer.
And WE have to play our part well–
attending the Unconscious
and bearing consciously
the responsibility
for seeing, hearing, and understanding–
for being mindfully aware of–
all that is presenting itself to us
in the external situation
and in our internal response to it,
and deciding in partnership
with the Unconscious
what to do about it
in each situation as it arises.
How equipped do you feel
to broker the deal?
Are you open
to searching out the equivalents
of Obi-wan Kenobi and Yoda,
and getting to work?
05/17/2017 — Looking at the Trump health care and budget proposals
makes it easy to conclude
that Trump wants to kill poor Americans,
prevent poor Americans from voting,
dry up sources of education for poor Americans,
and keep poor Americans poor
by maintaining an unlivable minimum wage
and offering nothing in the way of job training and placement.
Going to Make America Great Again
for those have no need of that kind of assistance in their lives.
And not even pity for those who do.

Everything depends upon our Conscious Ego
entering into a right relationship
with our Unconscious Mind/Self/Soul/Psyche.
Our Conscious Ego
is a full, responsible, essential partner
with the Unconscious,
and has the final word
on what is, and is not, done.
The first move–
and all that follow–
hinge upon what we
as Conscious Egos
do in relation to,
in relationship with,
our Unconscious.
The Unconscious cannot force
cooperation,
or veto choices.
Our Conscious Ego
has the final word.
Our life can be as fully,
or as faintly,
lived in conjunction
with the wisdom
of the Unconscious
as our Conscious Ego
is interested in,
and willing for,
that to happen.

05/19/2017— The Republicans are taking health care in the form of Planned Parenthood and the Affordable Care Act away from millions of people.

The Republicans who are casually flipping those switches from On to Off have never lived on the edge, do not know the gripping agony of having nowhere to turn, cannot imagine the aloneness and aching grief of being unable to meet their own basic needs and the needs of their family.

They don’t know what they are doing, or what the implications of their actions are for the people they have never met and do not care to meet. They have other concerns and issues that only the wealthy and privileged can fret over.

Republican is a class of having it made, and a lower class of wanting to have it made, which are far removed from the much, much lower class of trying to survive one day, one week, one month at a time.

Republicans are taking health care away from that class on the edge of not surviving. Republicans do not care if they don’t survive.

Republicans are a class of humanity with nothing humane about them. Making laws that destroy hope for millions of people they feel nothing for. Padding their own futures while leaving others with no future at all.

When we wake up, we wake up to our responsibility
for aligning ourselves with our Self–
the Self that is our
bedrock-
foundation-
ground-
center-
core-
essence-

Knowing that,
and doing that,
puts us in the company
of those who
have known that,
who have done that,
throughout the ages–
and have blessed the world
with the grace and goodness
that flow from that
since the beginning of time.

05/19/2017 — It’s interesting, to me,
the moods that come upon us.
I am certain they have an element
of unknown and mysterious composition
about them,
as though Something
we are not conscious of
is feeling its feelings through us…
I wonder if it may be ancestral,
genetic,
a part of our DNA–
and I wonder how much of “us”
is unknown to us,
out of the “frequency range” of consciousness,
yet, “there” in the background,
a part of the matrix,
the gestalt,
that comprises our “all-ness.”
And, how we might learn
to share ourselves
with What We Do Not Know,
trusting it to its business,
and asking it to not take more
than its fair share of the time
left to us on this “hither shore.”
There is more to us than meets the eye,
and some of it comes with its own interests,
needs and priorities.
We are not in charge of—
or responsible for—
a good bit that “goes on” within us!

05/19/2017 — What something means is found

in how we respond to it—

in how someone responds to it.

In how it shapes and forms our life,

or someone’s life.

In what we do with it,

about it,

or someone does.

In what impact it has upon us,

or upon someone.

If it doesn’t have any impact on anyone,

or anything,

it means nothing.

To talk about meaning

apart from impact and response

is to make meaningless noise.

Why do that?

05/19/2017— If I have nothing to hide,
I will fully cooperate with the investigation.
If I have something to hide,
I will hide it any way I can.
I expect I’m rather much like Donald Trump
in that regard.

Our contradictions,
our ambivalence,
our dichotomies
are all doorways
to integrity,
oneness
and wholeness.
We come together
in sharp focus
through the contemplation
of our opposites,
of our polarities.
Instead of engaging in
self-condemnation
and recrimination,
we extend olive branches
to ourselves
in a “This, too! This, too!”
kind of way.
Compassion and grace
heal the divisions within
(and without),
and open the way
to peace and goodwill.
The ground of our solidarity
is the acceptance–
the celebration–
of our different-ness.
As we accept ourselves
as we are,
and as we also are,
lay the foundation
for treating others
with the same benevolent regard–
and the shift is felt world-wide.

05/21/2017— King Snakes Courting — Backyard in Indian Land, South Carolina, May 19, 2017

Reading our body’s signals,
trusting our body’s wisdom,
and following our body’s inclinations
allow us to “stay close to home”
in picking our way
through the decisions and choices
that comprise our days.
When we begin
to allow our head
to take the lead,
with its agendas,
plans
and schemes,
we complicate matters
well beyond
the usual and customary.
Our head is good
for thinking.
Our body is good
for knowing.

05/21/2017— Under Trump’s Administration,
the phrase “War on Poverty”
means “War on the Poor.”

If we live long enough,
we run out of options.
If you can make your peace
with that,
you have it made,
if you call that
having it made.
What I’m saying is
eventually,
sooner or later,
our life is going
to require us to grow up.
Why put it off?
All we gain
is more time
in which to kid ourselves.
Stand up right now!
Is what I’m saying.
We are going to have to do
what we don’t want to do.
Why wait?
Why don’t we start dong the thing
that needs to be done
exactly as we would do it
if it were the thing
we most wanted to do
in all the world?
We’re going to have to do it anyway.
May as well be grown up about it.
The world would be a better place
with more people in it
who are grown up.
If you want to do something
that would make the greatest difference,
grow up!
Or act like you’re grown up,
whether you are or not.
It’s all the same to everybody else.

When things are out of sync we know it.
Getting the sync back means
seeking the silence,
attending the Unconscious
minding–and mining–our business
for clues regarding where
we got off track
and what we need to do
to get back on.
Distraction will be the culprit.
Too much attention in one area
means not enough in others.
Contradiction running unchecked,
living unnoticed,
unnoted,
keeps us from walking two paths
at the same time–
a sine qua non for
balance and sanity,
centering and peace.
Knowing what we know
is the sure track to sync.
Failing to be mindful of everything
keeps something unknown.
Find that–
name the thing–
and it all falls into place
until the next time forgetting
reminds us to be attentive
to the one forgotten thing.

05/23/2017 — Mick Mulvaney and his Republican pals are going to “help” people off of programs they need to survive by defunding the programs. Not only has Mulvaney redefined “compassion,” he has also redefined “help.” Talking to him and the Republican Bubble Heads nodding in full agreement with him is an exercise in futility and absurdity.

Republicans are redistricting voting precincts so that only Bubble Heads get to vote. Heaven for Republicans is a Bubble Head world.

05/24/2017 — Trump is the master of the overstatement.
The Grandstander par excellence.
Mr. Hey-Look-At-Me without peer.
The way he talks,
you would think
there would be something there.
It is only talk.
The worst kind of talk.
From the worst kind of person.
Trump is by far
the worst person
to hold the office of President of the United States
in my lifetime.
Money cannot buy class.
And it is no substitute for class.
Trump is the wrong way
to “the classless society.”

05/24/2017 — Trump is the Champion of Inequity.
The Destroyer of Human Rights.
The Grand Architect of the Wasteland.
The Great Enemy of the People Worldwide.
The Wrecking Ball of Civilization.
If you are on Trump’s side,
please note for the record
that he is not on yours.

Carl Jung said, “I have frequently seen people become neurotic
when they content themselves
with inadequate answers to the questions of life.”
Narcissistic Personality Disorder qualifies as a neurosis.
The things we make too little of,
and the things we make too much of,
limit the quality of life we live.
What do the things we think about
keep us from thinking about?
What makes us think they are not
worth thinking about?
How exclusively do we think about
the things we think about?
What makes us think they are
worth thinking about?
What are the questions of life
we have not answered,
or have answered inadequately?
What are the questions of life
that we persistently ignore
or put aside?
What makes us good company?
What makes us worth talking to?
How do you like to spend your money?
How do you like to spend your time?

Grace is a two-way street.
Or better:
Grace-and-kindness is a two-way street.
You can’t have one without the other.
Grace is kindness.
Kindness is grace.
“Unmerited benevolence,”
said the old theologian,
which is the only kind of benevolence.
What is benevolence that is earned,
deserved?
“Hey! Where’s my benevolence here?”
It isn’t benevolence if it is earned,

That’s payment.
There is no grace or kindness
in being given what we’ve earned.
That’s just good business.
It takes more than good business
to make the world run.
It takes grace-and-kindness.
We are saved by grace-and-kindness.
So is the savior.
“Grace-and-kindness, kid,
grace-and-kindness.”
Moved and mover save/serve each other
with grace-and-kindness.
They bless each other
with grace-and-kindness
for no reason.
Moved becomes mover,
mover becomes moved,
through grace-and-kindness.
There is no “unmoved mover.”
We are all moved.
To be incapable of being moved
is to be dead.
Beyond the reach of grace-and-kindness.
The parent graces the child with kindness.
The child graces the parent with kindness.
Nobody escapes the wonder of grace-and-kindness.
Except those who are dead.
To be alive is to be alive to–
and moved by–
the wonder of
grace-and-kindness.
As we extend it and receive it.
To be incapable of extending
grace-and-kindness
is to be incapable of receiving it.
That is to be dead
in the worst sense of the term.
Dead beyond hope of resurrection.
Alive without the hope of life.
Where does grace-and-kindness end
and love begin?
You cannot find that line,
though you search for it
with microscope and tweezers.
People who say, “I love you,”
without being gracious and kind
are people who want the words
to produce the magic
they are incapable of giving
or receiving.
Being loved and being loving
are the same thing,
brought to life by grace-and-kindness–
a miracle of life and being.
If you are going to be anything
be gracious and kind.
Even to those who cannot return the favor.
And will hate you for it.
Some people are beyond
being helped.
We can extend grace-and-kindness to them
but we cannot receive it for them.
They have to do some things
for themselves.
We separate ourselves
by our capacity for,
and response to,
grace-and-kindness.
It is what makes us human,
or not.

05/25/2017— I had arthroscopic surgery on both knees a week ago today. Things are going fine. “Fine” means different things at different points in our life. “Fine” at 72 is not worth a damn at 25. At both points it is “within the normal range.” “In the center of the bell-shaped curve.” “About what one can expect.” But, the expectations are different for each point. With age come different expectations, and different requirements for “fine.” Taking that shift into account, things are fine. I am doing well. Exactly as one might expect.

Everything has to be readjusted to fit our circumstances, to put us in accord with the time and place of our living. This is the constant adjustment to the nature and conditions of our life that is required by continuing maturation. As we age, our expectations change to fit our life. We make allowances. We grant concessions. We accept conditions that would not have made the cut twenty years before. We put up with things that would have been intolerable fifty years before. We draw our lines differently. And some lines not at all.

It all becomes acceptable at some point. “That’s just the way it is.” You can howl about it if you want to, and squall. But, when you get done, you are still going to have to get up and do the thing that needs to be done, protests not withstanding. May as well do it with an attitude and demeanor fitting to the occasion. Why growl at the surgeon, or snarl at the physical therapist? Or take it out on the nurses and the receptionists? The husband or the wife? Here we are! This is the way it is! We have no right to expect things to be any different than they are! Stand up insofar as you are able! Meet the day on its terms! Do what is asked of you! Without rancor, resentment or rage! Grace and kindness, Kid, grace and kindness. It is the solution to all of your problems today, every day.

“There are two rules for writing,” she said. “Write what wants to be written without knowing or caring where it is going.” “That’s crazy,” he said. “If that’s all there is to it, any fool could be a writer.” She said, “Fools can’t keep the rules.”

05/25/2017— “Now look what you made me do!”
is becoming Republicans’ go to defense.
It is right up there with
“It’s people like you
who make people like me
hate people like you!”
Members of Congress
and Congressional wanna-be’s
are channeling
elementary school playgrounds
at recess.
Voters have to demand
maturity and accountability.
Smooth talking double talk
has to be replaced
with people who
tell you what they are going to do
and do what they say.
It isn’t health care
when it removes 23 million people
from the insured rolls.
But, ask them about it
and they throw you to the ground
and tell you they are sick
of hearing about it.
They may be sick,
but they have insurance
provided by the government,
but you can’t have it
because they say so.
The moral is clear:
Vote for the Democrat
every chance you get

Power is useless if it doesn’t make things better.
Better for whom, is the question.
A lot of people–
suicide bombers, for instance–
are willing to make things worse
for themselves
if it will make thing worse for others.
They take the tack of,
“It will make things better for me
if it makes things worse for you,
even if it makes things worse for me.”
Worse is better for them.
They use whatever power
is available to them
to make things worse for others,
and they think that is better.
In this way Republicans
are similar to suicide bombers.
They sacrifice themselves
to prevent other classes of people
whom they do not like,
despise,
can’t stand,
would see in hell
before they would share paradise with,
from having advantages,
pleasures,
joys,
or anything resembling a good life.
Abortionists,
Muslims,
Blacks,
LGBTQ’s,
Women,
Immigrants,
Latinos,
Jews,
The Poor,
Disabled,
Disadvantaged,
The list is long…
Are people they would
make things worse for
even if it meant making things
worse for themselves.
This is raw hatred at work in the world.
They will vote for fewer benefits
for themselves
if it means fewer benefits
for THEM.
Suffering to make others suffer
is their idea of better.
Those of us who are appalled
at the very idea
that there could be those
of that persuasion
in large enough numbers
to elect people
who will gladly make things worse
for them and the people they hate
have to wake up to the truth
of how things are.
Hatred works well as a political lever.
Dilute the vote with a Libertarian candidate.
Restrict voting rights.
Vote on weekdays, not weekends,
and have few polling places to reduce turnout.
And you have a recipe for winning
with Hatred as your base.
Those of us who are horrified
by this reality
have to realize what we are up against
and prepare for the task at hand:
Calling out Hatred for what it is,
and making people conscious
of their role as suicide-like-bombers
in the destruction of the values
at the heart of democracy,
and force them to be accountable
for who they are–
to see themselves as they are–
and work to out-vote them
in every election great and small
for the rest of time,
working to make things better
for the whole,
even if there are those
who cannot enjoy the good
if they have to share it with
those they hate.

05/26/2017 — Changing minds is not the issue.
Confirming minds is the issue.
Encouraging minds to be resolute is the issue.
Helping minds toward clarity and conviction is the issue.
I’m not here to have you think like I think.
I am here to have you think like you think–
to have you think about your thinking
and think what you think deliberately,
with awareness, determination and dedication–
to think what you think out loud
and put what you think into action,
into how you live
and what you do
and how you vote.
If all people were consciously, intentionally,
thinking what they are thinking
and living in light of what they determine for themselves
to be good, and lovely, and decent, and worthy to be done,
I would say, “Well. That’s as much as we can ask of ourselves.”
And would be square with what the day brings.
Too many people are thinking what they think they are supposed to think,
without thinking about what they are thinking–
without being aware of the contradictions among their thoughts–
without thinking through what needs to be thought through
in order to live the life that is as good as they can make it be.
They settle for someone else telling them
they are doing what they are supposed to be doing,
shirking the responsibility of determining for themselves
what that is.
Shameful.
Bad.
Terrible.
Think for yourself.
Be responsible for your own thoughts and actions.
Live from your own heart–
not from what someone else tells you should be your heart.
Be willing to go to hell
for what YOU say is good.

Here’s a mantra for you:
“Nevertheless, It is well,”
which may also be phrased,
“Nevertheless, all is well.”
Here’s how it works:
“We are all (fill in the blank)
a missed step,
a phone call,
a tornado,
a heart attack,
a terrorist attack,
a car crash,
…
away from the complete loss of everything.
Nevertheless, it is well.”
This goes hand-in-hand
with the foundational realization,
“It is all useless, pointless, hopeless, absurd
and coming to a very bad end
(we are all going to die)–
and how we live in the meantime
makes all the difference!–
and nevertheless, it is well!”
The key to being able to say this
and mean it
lies with our being in right relationship
with our soul,
with our psyche,
with the part of ourselves
that is unconscious to us.
We have to be aligned with our soul.
Everything flows from there.
Everything falls into place around that.
Our work
is learning to live aligned with our soul.
All is truly, absolutely, fundamentally, well
when we are at-one with our soul.
And this has nothing to do with theology.
It doesn’t matter what we believe
or do not believe.
It has solely to do with living soulfully,
as our soul would have us live,
as our soul needs us to live
in order to express itself and come forth
in our life.
Our soul is the living aspect of our life.
We are more alive the closer to our soul we live.
We are less alive the farther from soul we live.
Live to be alive!
Let your sense of vitality, passion, enthusiasm–
being at one with what is right for you,
in sync with what IS you,
in the service of what, who, and how
you are to be–
be your guide to your soul,
to your soul’s need of you
and the life it needs you to live.
Do what resonates with you.
Do not do what causes you to recoil,
gives you the hives,
or the dry heaves,
or the cold sweats…
Live to be the champion of your soul,
your soul’s best friend,
your soul’s true mate.
And it will be well.
No matter what.

05/27/2017— To live at-one with our soul
is to see every “hour”
as our finest hour–
the place where
our light shines brightest and best.
Every moment is
the moment we have lived for,
the moment we are built for,
the reason we have come.
We are here to be alive, now!
To do what needs us to do it, now!
Let there be no shrinking back!
Standing on the ground
that is who we are–
that is our bedrock identity–
our purest value,
our truest loyalty,
our deepest love,
we step forth to meet
the day,
the hour,
the moment
of our living,
and do there what is ours to do,
and be there who we are!
And so, when the dog
throws up on the carpet,
we clean up the mess.
And when our children are distressed,
we comfort them.
And when we are sick,
we do what a return to health requires.
We allow things to be as they are,
and do what needs to be done about them,
out of the ground of our being,
the heart of what is truest and best
about us–
to our soul’s vibrant joy and delight.

05/27/2017— Grocery shopping can be a meditative exercise.
Walking through a grocery store
is as meditative as walking the labyrinth.
The aisles invite us to experience the world,
and all of life,
and the wonder of food production–
planting, growing, harvesting, marketing, transportation, presentation…
A grocery trip is a trek to a holy place,
a pilgrimage made by all people of every age
in one way or another.

05/27/2017 — The fix for isolation and alienation
is solitude.
No kidding.
Solitude is the practice
of the art
of being with ourselves.
Until we can be with ourselves,
we are not fit company for anyone.
The world will never be
a softer,
kinder,
gentler,
more gracious place
until we can treat ourselves
like we want others to treat us.
In the silence of solitude,
we meet ourselves.
Everything that comes up
in the silence,
comes up from within,
comes up from us.
We practice receiving
with mindful,
compassionate,
awareness
all that meets us in the silence–
in a “This, too. This, too,” kind of way.
Once we get that down with ourselves,
we are ready to extend it to everyone–
holding all in our awareness,
letting all things be
as they are,
surrounded by our grace and compassion,
blessed by our presence,
transformed,
or not,
by our acceptance
and our love.
Poof!
No more isolation.
No more alienation.
Because of solitude!

05/27/2017 — The Will to Life that propels the Dandelion through the asphalt,
is at work with us all
to bring forth “the face that was ours before we were born”
into the time and place,
conditions and circumstances,
of our life in the world.
If the Conscious Ego is cooperative
with the Unconscious Urge to Be at our core,
our life will exhibit a vitality and a grace
incapable of being impersonated.
And if our Unconscious Ego has a better idea
for a life of its own,
and no time for the beckonings within,
we will never escape the nagging sense
that things are not right somehow,
that something is missing,
that this isn’t it,
no matter how glossy, gleaming
and picture perfect it all appears to be.
To say “No!” to the voice of our soul,
is to “sin against the Holy Ghost,”
and forever seek redemption
for opportunities lost
and chances too long gone.

05/27/2017 — Ah, but it is such a “slippery slope,”
“a dangerous path,”
“like a razor’s edge,”
that we cross with each choice,
every decision.
Do we stay or go?
Act or wait?
Take the right turn or the left?
Buy the house?
Move to town?
Sell the farm?
Settle for what we have
or strive for unequaled wealth?
Marry this one or that one?
Take this job or the other one?
Go to that school or a different one?
Pursue this major or another one?
Everything hangs in the balance each time,
and we have no idea where we will be better off,
and have no way of knowing.
“Look before you leap,”
is no help because
“Whoever hesitates is lost!”
We are given a life
with no User’s Manual,
and are here, now
by Fortune and Grace.
Yet, in looking back,
it often seems as though
an invisible hand was guiding our way.
We see a purpose at work
where we stumbled and fell,
meaning where we were bereft and hopeless,
and here we are
as though by design.
May we take comfort
in the appearance of those
invisible means of support–
without theology or explanation,
doctrine or dogma,
just the comfort of knowing
we are not alone,
that “Within each of us is another whom we do not know” (Carl Jung),
and step into the darkness
confident that the darkness
is home to our soul.

05/27/2017 — Don’t have to know why!
Don’t have to explain experience!
Don’t have to make sense of things!
Live with wonder!
Play like a child in a marvelous universe
without needing to know
what makes it work,
or how to get it to work
in our behalf,
to your advantage,
benefit,
profit
and good.
Free yourself from
theology,
doctrine,
dogma,
and all Rube Goldberg constructions
that take the fun out of mystery,
and rob awe of its soul!

05/27/2017 — We can’t be chasing wealth and glory!
We have to do the work!
We only have so much life energy,
only so much time!
We have to be deliberate and decisive,
conscious and mindfully aware!
We have to separate the shiny beads and silver mirrors
from the ground of heart and soul,
and let our fond wishes for life go
in the service of our life’s wishes for its own secret pleasure.
We have to say no to what looks inviting,
and yes to what calls our name.

Falling in love requires us to do the work of love.
The work of love is walking two paths at the same time.
Along the slippery slope,
the dangerous path,
the razor’s edge.
We go slip-sliding away
when we lose sight of the other
as a metaphor of the heart
for ourselves,
sent to us by the heart
to open our eyes
to the truth
of what needs to come forth in–
to be brought forth by–
ourselves,
working on ourselves
with the other in mind.
What attracts us to the other
lies latent in ourselves,
and shows itself to us
in the form and substance
of the other,
winks at us,
and says, “How about me, Sweetie?”
We get to ourselves through the other,
by way of the other.
WE are our soul’s mate!
And find our soul reaching for us
in the arms of the other.
The work of love
is knowing what’s what
and who’s who.
Carl Jung’s thoughts on the Anima/Animus
is about the Me in Thee,
and the Thee in Me,
with each of us being the threshold of life eternal
for the other.
We see in the other
what is to be found within ourselves,
and must not forget
that the mirror
is reflecting
our projection
of where we need to look
and what we need to do:
bring ourselves forth
as the other’s gift to us!
Our lover is an ever present
subject of meditation,
revealing us to ourselves,
calling us to depths perceived only
through the eyes of our heart.

05/28/2017 — What keeps Trump from doing the right thing?
With him money is the Bottom Line.
Profit At Any Price is his operating principle.
If he can make more money doing the wrong thing
that, for him, IS the right thing to do!
Trump has sold his soul–
again and again–
to the highest bidder,
blind to the true value
of all the values
higher than fame and fortune.

05/28/2017 — Trump’s absence of forethought, insight, realization and compassion points to a complete lack of humanity. He would not score on a scale rating the positive qualities that make us human. But he would rank high on negative qualities. Whales, dolphins, porpoises, and elephants are more human-like than Trump is.

05/28/2017 — Our life takes shape around
what we care about,
what we love,
what we value with our deepest affection,
our highest passion.
What we care about
is the heart, ground, foundation, bedrock
of our existence.
People who are adrift, isolated, cutoff, alienated
from one another and from themselves
do not have a central, core, concern
around which they coalesce
as a viable, well-defined and self-directed
human being.
We have to have something in our life
more important than our own ease and comfort
that we serve with loyalty and allegiance
all our life long.
Jesus said it best:
“Those who would save their life will lose it,
but those who lose their life in the service
of that which is greater than they are
will find it” (or words to that effect).

05/28/2017 — Putin certainly knew what he was doing–but, he could not have known how easy it would be.
The complete collapse of American Democracy, morals and values in 5 months, without a shot being fired.
The Republican Party willingly, even eagerly, serving as an extension of the Communist Party, gleefully dancing on the tombs of the Founders of the Republic. Laughing, applauding one another, smug, arrogant, ruthless, cruel, and without regret in their role as the Destroyers of Liberty and Justice For All.
The Star-Spangled Banner waves no more o’re the land of the free and the home of the brave.

05/28/2017 — If the Russians had come with guns, bombs and missiles they wouldn’t have had a chance. But they came with loans and investments, and carried the day.

The first rule of war is Know Your Enemy. The Russians knew exactly who they were dealing with, and how to close the deal.

Trump thinks the free press is his Enemy. He has no idea of what he is up against, or to what extent he has been taken in. He is so good at declaring victory, and so bad at winning.

If the British had landed with some investment bankers and a couple of boat loads of money, do you think the Continental Congress would have said, “Well, Okay! Now we’re DEALING!” And called the whole thing off?

All of this started 241 years ago
with two groups of people
with radically different ideas
of how America should be.
Freedom, Justice, Truth and Equality
have not had an easy time of it
over the years.
The Patriotic Dream has prevailed
due to the spirit of those
who refuse to give it up to
appearance, impression, facade, pretense–
knowing that it depends upon
who we ARE,
not who we say we are.
Republicans pay lip service
to Freedom, Justice, Truth and Equality
but they are reticent
about serving them with their life–
and refuse to see that they apply
fully and completely
to all people everywhere.
Patriotism requires
life in the service of the true good of all.

05/29/2017 — Individual, personal, authority–
grounded upon and living out of
our own experience,
standards,
values
and ideals–
is strictly dependent upon
silence and solitude.
No one can tell us who we are,
or what is important to us,
or how we need to live
in each situation,
in each moment,
as it arises,
to bring ourselves forth,
exhibit/express/incarnate/reveal
the truth we have come to serve
in ways that are appropriate
to the occasion.
All of that comes to us from within
as an urge to life
shaped and formed by our unique vision
of what is Me and Not Me
and how that needs to be presented
in the time and place of our living.
And THAT is dependent upon our
devotion to and practice of
mindful, compassionate, awareness
in regular returns to silence and solitude.
Silence and solitude
are the sine qua non
of imagination and creativity,
the source of life and being.
Without them,
we can only be mock-ups,
cut-outs,
standees,
and standups,
with no mind or life of our own.

05/29/2017 — When the forces at work in a situation
have the momentum
and control the play of possibilities,
the situation will remain in their hands
until a shift happens.
The shift is at the direction
of the fullness of time.
“The fullness of time”
is a phrase that is equivalent to
“the movement of the Tao.”
Nobody knows what they mean,
but everyone knows the reality
of a tomato going from not quite ready
to ready,
or of a banana going from ripe
to over-ripe.
Our place is to put ourselves in accord
with the drift of time
and the movement of the Tao,
remain clear about what is happening,
and wait.
And when the door opens,
walk through.

05/30/2017 — Theology is what is wrong with religion.
Strip religion of its theology
and you are left with the wonder
of experience.
Put theology in religion
and you do not need experience.
Theology is a substitute for experience.
Theology evaluates/judges/dismisses/disregards/rejects/denies
experience.
Religion grounded in theology
is worse than no religion at all.
Good religion is grounded upon experience
without/beyond the need of explanation.
Explanations of experience become theology.
Experience without explanation
forms the religious core
of a life well-lived.
Live for the experience of being alive.
Eschew explanations,
doctrines,
dogma,
beliefs,
theology.
Experience is self-validating
and is beyond debate.
Theology is infinitely debatable–
and exists only in the head.
Religion is a matter of the heart.

Take Paul’s statement in Philippians,
“It is God who works in you
to will and to do
for his good purpose,”
and place it in any holy book
outside of the Bible,
and you have a completely different feel
for what is being said.
Or take the statement,
“God is working his purpose out,
as year succeeds to year,”
from the Christian hymn
by Arthur Campbell Aigner,
and place it in a book
of Taoist poems,
and you transform the possibilities
for understanding what is being said.
Theology screws with truth,
and a statement becomes only true
from the standpoint of the theology
surrounding the statement.
“God” can only mean
“the triune father God
of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob,”
or (and a lot of people would say “and”),
“the Father Almighty,
Creator of heaven and earth”
and “the Father of Jesus Christ His
only Son, Our Lord…”
And nothing can be said
that hasn’t been said,
and everything has to be understood
in light of the way everything has been understood,
and religion is divorced from life,
and life is lived devoid of an experiential connection
with the heart of life,
and everyone sits around waiting to die
so they can then enjoy life
“on the yonder shore,”
missing the wonder and joy all about them
on this, “the hither shore.”
It is completely absurd,
and undeniable.
Assumptions form expectations
and discount experience to the contrary.
And we have to find our way back
to “the uncarved block,”
to “the face that was ours before we were born,”
by refusing to take anything “on faith,”
and knowing only what we know
in light of our on-going reflection
on experience
in order to form new realizations
and have new experiences
all our life long.

05/30/2017 — We remember:
Emmett Till,
James Chaney,
Michael Schwerner,
Andrew Goodman,
Medgar Evers,
Martin Luther King, Jr.
Viola Gregg Liuzzo,
Jimmie Lee Jackson
George Lee,
Lamar Smith,
John Earl Reese,
Willie Edwards, Jr.
Mack Charles Parker,
Herbert Lee,
Louis Allen,
Roman Ducksworth, Jr.
Paul Guihard
William Lewis Moore,
Addie Mae Collins,
Denise McNair,
Carole Robertson,
Cynthia Wesley
Virgil Lamar Ware,
Bruce Klunder,
Henry Hezekiah Dee,
Charles Eddie Moore,
Lemuel Penn,
Jimmie Lee Jackson,
James Reeb,
Oneal Moore,
Willie Brewster,
Jonathan Myrick Daniels,
Samuel Leamon Younge, Jr.
Vernon Ferdinand Dahmer,
Ben Chester White,
Clarence Triggs,
Warlest Jackson,
Benjamin Brown,
Samuel Ephesians Hammond Jr.,
Delano Herman Middleton,
Henry Ezekial Smith,
and all the others who have lost their life
at the hands of racism expressing itself
in the form of White Supremacy.
And all those who have lost their life
at the hands of homophobia and/or White Supremacy.
And here we are, still waiting for all people
to be free to be who they are,
honored, respected and recognized as persons of worth and value,
around the table,
across the board
regardless of race,
religion,
gender,
sexual orientation,
age,
physical or mental ability
or any other basis for discrimination and bigotry.
Republican voters cannot begin to realize
what they have unleashed
by failing to see what they were looking at,
by failing to hear what they were listening to,
by refusing to be aware of what they were doing–
giving us all a leader who is a clandestine White Supremacist,

and Republican members of the House and Senate who have
mastered the art of standing for nothing and doing less.
We cannot cease to be vigilant and passionate
in the service of voting/civil/equal/human rights!
Those who would relax laws governing discrimination and bigotry
have to be opposed swiftly and ardently
at every turn.
We owe it to ourselves and to each other
to be strong in the service of
Liberty, Justice, Compassion, Equality
for as long as life shall last.

There is knowing what is happening
and what needs to happen
and what needs to be done about it
and what we can do about it
with the gifts that are ours to give
for the good of the situation as a whole.
And there is knowing what keeps
us from doing any of this.
And there is knowing what enables
us to do all of it.
And that is all of the knowing
we need to know.

05/31/2017 —

Carl Jung said, “Most people confuse ‘self-knowledge’
with knowledge of their conscious ego personalities.”
There is more to us than meets the eye.
The place of our “conscious ego personality”
is to exercise its authority
for knowing where to draw the line
between the polarities/opposites/dichotomies
that separate conscious from unconscious.
The unconscious doesn’t know anything
about drawing lines.
It’s all one big swirling mess in there.
The unconscious invented consciousness
to help it sort things out,
organize and order
the whirl of blurring truth.
The unconscious knows way more
than consciousness, but,
consciousness is responsible
for drawing the lines
required to make things work.
Never mind if they are proper or improper.
Just draw them
and then redraw them
when it becomes obvious
that they need to be adjusted.
The unconscious can’t do that.
The unconscious depends upon consciousness
to enable it to be mindfully aware
of itself in relation to itself.
Consciousness has to assume its role
as Structural Engineer
in setting limits
and deciding who, what, when, where, why and how.
The catch is
that consciousness can carry out its duties
only in steady,
deliberate,
conscious
consultation with the unconscious.
Consciousness must commune with the unconscious
for things to hum like a choir in tune with itself.
That’s where things begin to fall apart.
We have lost the art of communion with our soul.
Recovery and restoration
are all that stand between us
and harmony, peace, wellness and well-being.
You would think we would make that a priority.
Wouldn’t you?

05/31/2017 — We cannot talk to Donald Trump
or to racist, bigoted, hate-filled white supremacists
he has emboldened.
There is nothing to say to stem their rage.
We can only work to out-vote them
and enforce laws that reduce their impact
on civility,
good will
and well-being
word-wide.
They will be with us always
to the end of the age.
A Native American anecdote applies:
When young people from the tribe
left to seek their fortune in the world,
they were told
“As you go on your way throughout your life,
the birds of the air will shit on you.
Do not even pause to wipe it off.”

05/31/2017 — We have a clandestine White Supremacist
in the White House,
and others on the Cabinet,
and Republican enablers
in the House and Senate
supporting racism, bigotry, discrimination
and White Supremacy
with their deafening silence on these matters.
The people who voted for them cannot be silent as well.
If you voted for Donald Trump
and Republican members of the House and Senate,
you must stand strong against them now!
Make at least weekly phone calls to their offices
registering your disgust at their failure
to come out strong against the racist bigots
of our times,
and demand enforcement of laws protecting
citizens from being victimized by hatred.
Write them all at least one post card a week
stressing the same things.
Do. Not. Let. This. Go.
Do. Not. Let. Opposing. Racism. Rest.
YOU put these people in their place of leadership.
YOU must assume responsibility
for calling their hand
and insisting upon them standing
against hatred and for justice and equal rights
for all people.
Do not be slow to respond!
And to those of you who did not vote for Trump
or for a Republican member of Congress,
your responsibility is clear as well.
Make your phone calls,
write your post cards,
insist upon an atmosphere/environment
in which people are safe,
respected,
honored,
and treated well
regardless of their religion,
race,
physical or mental ability,
sexual orientation,
gender or gender preference.
Be a strong voice for compassion,
equality
and justice for all.
Beginning tonight.

“The Situation is Hopeless,
but Not Serious”
Is the title of one of Paul Watzlawick’s books.
It is true with every situation.
We take every thing too seriously.
We have to live at the fulcrum
between Serious and Without Consequence.
Of course, there are consequences,
but they are Not Serious.
Of course, they cannot be ignored
or treated lightly
as though they are trivial
or insignificant.
Nor can they be allowed to distract
us from the counter-truth:
All is well!
Matter. What.
We are never without the guiding presence
of who Carl Jung was talking about
when he said,
“Within each of us there is another,
whom we do not know.”
Nothing can happen to destroy
that relationship,
or to keep us from being grounded upon
the bedrock of our own identity
and purpose.
We can be who we are,
and do what is ours to do
in every situation that comes along.
Victor Frankl came out of
Hitler’s death camps
having witnessed the fact
that meaning lives anywhere, everywhere.
It only takes those with eyes to see
to find it, live it.
The only reason to despair
is when we lose sight of the truth
that there is no reason to despair,
only more work to be done.
We hand over our idea
of how things ought to be,
and step into doing what
needs to be done
about how things are–
in a “Here we are, now what?”
kind of way.
When you don’t know what to do,
do the thing that needs to be done
here and now.
And then, the thing after that.
The way it needs to be done.
The way only you can do it.
Out of the bedrock of who you are.
Doing what is good
whether it does any good or not.
Being truly, eternally, continually,
good for nothing!
And see where it goes.

06/01/2017 — Confirmation,
affirmation,
validation,
authentication,
verification
are all forms
of authorization
that ground us
in the truth
of our own truth,
and encourage us
in the work
of living out
of our own sense
of what needs to be done
in the strength
of our own conviction,
and our own sense
of how to do it.
It takes a community
to produce individuals–
but it has to be the
right kind of community:
A “we” who know they
are in the service of the “I.”
“We” help each other
find the ground under
our own feet,
stand up,
and be who we are,
in facing what must be faced,
and doing what must be done
as only we can do that
as the individual we are.

Clarity and focus are the foundational elements
of a life worth living.
We can lose the way
in 10,000 ways.
There is a different manifestation
of the Cyclops
at every turn–
new reasons to
leave the path
and abandon
the life that calls us to live it
saunter up to us each day
asking, “Who cares?
Why try?
What difference does it make
what you do?”
To be answered each time with,
“Who cares if nobody cares?
Why NOT try?
What difference does it make
if nothing makes any difference?
I’m going to do right
by my life
whether you like it or not!”
Clarity and focus, Kid.
Clarity and focus.
In the early days of my photography apprenticeship,
I would wake up in the early hours
and wrestle with whether to get up
and drive into the mountains
to wait in the cold for a sunrise
that might not appear
because of fog or clouds,
and from within would come the question
“Are you a photographer or not?”
And,
“Are you going to be who you are or not?”
We have to be clear about who we are–
and who we are not–
and focused on doing what is required
to bring that forth
in the time and place
of our living,
no matter what.

05/02/2017 — We have to be able to transcend
a situation
in order to be able to act there
for the good of the situation
as a whole–
in order to be able to offer there
what the situation needs
out of the gifts
we have to offer.
To be able to rise to meet
any occasion
means to be able
to rise above it.

05/02/2017 — Carl Jung said,
“If I want to understand
an individual human being,
I must . . . adopt a completely new
and unprejudiced attitude.”
This applies also
to situations and circumstances.
We cannot have an emotional stake
in the relationship,
or the situation,
or the circumstance
and hope to understand it
and respond appropriately to it.
We have to be able
to not care about it
in order to deal with it
in caring, loving, ways.
This is how emergency room personnel
have to respond to every
person and situation
that comes in the door.
In order to see/understand
the person/situation
and respond in ways
appropriate to the occasion,
they have to achieve
and maintain
“working distance”
between themselves and the situation.
If they are too close
or too distant
they are no help.
We have to find the “sweet spot”
between ourselves and our life,
and live out of that position
in relation to everything
that comes our way.

Liberty, Justice, Compassion, Equality.
What’s so hard about that?
Greed doesn’t want to go,
and Hatred, Racism, Sexism, Homophobia and Xenophobia
refuse to leave.
There has to be a reckoning.

A reckoning would require us
to face ourselves down.
To grow ourselves up.
To become who the situation
needs us to be.
Tasks that are well within our reach,
yet exceed our grasp–
because our heart isn’t in the work
that has to be done.
We don’t want
to do what it takes
to become
who we are asked to be
by the situation that has arisen.
And, nothing is going to happen
to improve things
until that does.
Given the choice between
growing up and self/other-destruction,
too many of us opt for the latter
too often.

06/04/2017— When Carl Jung said,
“In each of us
there is another
whom we do not know.”
And when Jesus said,
“The Father and I are one.”
And Paul said,
“It is no longer I who live,
but Christ who lives within me,”
And,
“I can do all things
through him
who strengthens me.”
They were talking
about the same thing.
We are the source
of that which has
always been called “God.”
That which has
always been called “God”
is the source of us.
“God” is as genetic
as blue eyes and red hair.
Those who seek “God”
need to look no farther
than their DNA.
“God” is the ground
of our being–
the origin of all
that is us,
and not-us,
about us.
The not-us part
of our experience,
we call “Satan,”
to keep ourselves sane,
but it is all “God.”
“God/Christ is all
and in all,”
as the Good Book says.
That being the case,
you might think
that we would be
more curious about,
and attentive to,
all that goes on within–
students of our own
life-experience–
living to be at-one
with who we are,
and also are.
Perhaps, that is
just too much for us,
so we settle
for old movies
and stamp collecting.

06/04/2017 — Our life has taught us
that we can deal with our life.
Here we are!
Still dealing!
What more proof do you need?
So quit with the fear, anguish, panic and depression!
You have what it takes
to take on the worst
life can offer!
The only thing that can throw you
is your thinking anything can!
Think “Nothing can!”
and you will be right.
And you will have it made!

05/04/2017 — Trump’s great shame–greatest shame–
is his incapacity to recognize
all that he has to be ashamed of.

05/04/2017 — Ortega y Gasset, in “Meditations on Quixote,” said:

“There are (those who) decide not to be satisfied with reality. Such (people) aim at altering the course of things; they refuse to repeat gestures that custom, tradition, or biological instincts force them to make. These (people) we call heroes, because to be a hero means to be one out of many, to be oneself. If we refuse to have our actions determined by heredity or environment, it is because we seek to base the origin of our actions on ourselves and only ourselves. The hero’s will is not that of (his or her) ancestors or society, but (his or her) own. This will to be oneself is heroism.”

This is the difference between life and death–
between being alive to your choices and possibilities,
and being mostly dead.
If you are going to be anything,
be you.

05/04/2017 — We find our way,
however halt
and stumbling
we go,
to those who have
exactly what we need
exactly when we need it.
Our life is a miracle–
is one miracle after another–
of water in the desert
pouring out of a rock
that looks like every other rock
but is a wellspring
of living water
to a parched
and desperate soul.

05/04/2017 — Our work
(not what we are paid to do)
requires a regimen
that supports our work,
including silence
and mindfulness meditation
(you could call it prayer–
communion with the center,
with the core,
with more than words can say).
We don’t get a vacation
from the routine
that is a lifeline
to the heart of life and being–
our connection with the will
at work within us
to do what needs to be done
through us
every day of our life.

I’ve lost track of the number of times
Jesus said, “Do not sit in judgment!”
(or words to that effect),
but his words are wasted
on his followers.
Judgment is what Christians do best.
Everybody not like them
is going to hell in their book.
Heresy trials,
witch hunts,
torture,
drownings
and burnings at the stake
were common practice
during the years
of Christian domination,
with shaming,
shunning,
ostracizing,
and humiliating
continuing to the present hour.
Muslim bans are just another example
of Xenophobia at work
among those Jesus told,
“Love your enemies!”
Terrorism against Muslims
is not called terrorism,
and Christian extremism
is not called extremism,
and no one calls for
“rounding up” or “banning”
white supremacists.
The rhetoric of hatred
inflames hatred.
Jesus clearly did not know
how to motivate his people,
or what it takes to be safe
and happy at last.

05/05/2017 — Donald Trump is beyond
remorse, regret, guilt and
heart-felt apology.
That puts him in the company
of world-class predators
in every age–
always in the hunt
for those he can
humiliate, crush, defeat, destroy, disgrace, debase
and toss aside.
It’s always a contest with Trump
to triumph over all
and reign supreme–
at least in his own mind.

Good religion puts us in accord
with the Actual Facts
in the Real World
of Tangible
Concrete
Objective

Bad religion sews discord
with its Alternative Facts
and its Imaginary Universe
packed with Angels
and Demons,
and its Superstitions
(which it calls True Beliefs)
about what to do on Sunday
and how to keep God on your side.
You can separate good religion
from bad
based on what it asks you to affirm,
and what it asks you to deny–
on what it asks you to understand/experience,
and what it asks you to “take on faith.”
If you are going to “take something on faith,”
take evolution and continental drift on faith,
not Satan and the lava lakes of Hell.

05/06/2017 — Here are a couple of books, manuals, really, to help you along your way…

“Wherever You Go, There You Are,” by Jon Kabat-Zinn

“The Power of Focusing,” by Ann Weiser Cornell

These aren’t books to speed through, but are sources for meditation and practice.

You can have the best collection of recipe books in the world,

but if you never cook, what’s the point?

05/06/2017 — Carl Jung said,
“I answer for my ancestors
the questions their lives
left behind.”
And I would add,
and ask for them the questions
their lives did not allow
them to consider.
We live to uncover and to answer
the questions of existence–
the questions life forces upon the living–
to face those questions straight up
and to not quit the struggle
until it is done.
It is not ours to know
what happens to us when/after we die.
Perhaps we wink out of existence entirely.
Perhaps we fade away.
Perhaps we fold into the next incarnation
of the long line of ancestors
encoded in our DNA.
I do believe that I am the current manifestation
of all of those who have gone before me–
that I am a unique and unrepeatable
blend of the genes I have inherited,
and that I work the work of the species
and of my particular line within the species,
presenting “who I am”
in all of the situations and occasions
which call me forth
and ask me to render
what is mine to give.
Apart from those situations and occasions,
I am not much of anything,
protoplasm awaiting some unimagined trigger mechanism
to spark some unknown element within
that I am capable of shaping
to meet the demands/the opening of the moment.
I am who I find myself to be within the NOW of my life.
So are you.
We live ourselves into being,
into reality,
into existence.
Life does not begin until we say “YES!”
to what is being asked of us,
and work to answer questions
our ancestors left behind.

05/06/2017 — It starts with bearing the pain.
The pain of life.
The pain of living THIS life
and not some other, better, finer, more fun
life instead.
The pain is the pain of the discrepancies between
how things are and how we want them to be.
Physical pain,
emotional pain,
the pain of what we have done
and of what has been done to us,
the of what we have failed to do,
and of what has failed to be done to us,
the pain of our ancestors
seeking an outlet and expression in us–
psychic pain built up through unimaginable
encounters with grief, loss and sorrow through time…
That pain.
It starts with our bearing it all.
Where do we go to learn how to bear the pain
of being alive?
Who talks to us about the art of bearing the pain of life?
All we know is denial.
Deflection.
Escape.
Addiction.
But.
Life cannot begin
until we square ourselves up with the pain
that is ours to bear,
and attend it with
compassionate, mindful, awareness
all along the way.

05/06/2017 — No one can bear the pain of our life for us.
The work is ours to do alone.
No one can live our life for us,
or tell us what life is ours to live.
The right kind of company
is essential
for the work that is ours to do,
and the right kind of company
knows the difference between
“the help that help is all about,”
and “the help we all could do without”
(Shel Silverstein).

05/06/2017 — No matter how we feel,
we still have to live
in the present moment.
We still have to meet the moment
on its terms,
and do there what needs to be done.
How we feel
may interfere with that,
or assist with it,
but the moment itself
calls us beyond feeling,
past feeling,
into seeing,
hearing,
knowing,
doing,
and being.
Being present with the moment
in awareness of the moment,
including whatever feelings
we may have regarding the moment,
allows us to hold all of it in awareness,
watching,
listening,
seeing,
hearing,
waiting for the right action
to arise of itself
at the right time
to do what needs us to do it
the way it needs to be done.
And step into the next moment,
the one that is already flowing
from this one.

05/06/2017 — I have never known anyone
who “got it” less than,
or even, equal to,
Donald Trump.
I do so wish Trump could
not get it
the way Chauncey Gardiner
didn’t get it.
Or,
that Trump could get
that he doesn’t get it.
About anything.
Can he actually keep score in golf?
Can he find his way through a course
on his own?

Meaning isn’t found,
it is lived,
cultivated,
created,
produced
and maintained
in the service
of that which is
deepest, truest and best
about us–
of that which is integral
to our identity,
being
and well-being.
It is getting the ratios right.
It is being at one with ourselves.
Living from the center
of who we are.
Walking the path
with our name on it–
the path that is our path to walk
through the times and places–
the best of them
and the worst of them–
of our life.
“We know when we are on the beam,
and when we are off of it”
(Joseph Campbell).
Live to be on the beam.
Live in ways that
make your little heart sing.
What’s stopping you?

Not one of us has enough time.
That means we have to pay
close attention
to the time we have.
There are no throw-away moments!
There is no time during any day
that is not worthy of our
being fully present
and fully attentive.
We cannot spend a second
lost in some mood,
unavailable to what
is present with us
hoping to be seen,
heard,
felt,
acknowledged,
honored with our recognition
and held in our awareness.

06/08/2017 — The Post Card of the Week
(To the President, the two SC Senators, and the six SC Representatives):

Dear _____,

Do you support a livable wage?
If so, you should be living in its service
and in the service of those
who depend on you to make it happen.
If you do not support a livable wage,
you are helping those who need no help,
and ignoring those who do.
And you should be ashamed.

Sincerely…

06/08/2017 — The jungle is savage
in its own way,
and civilization is savage
in its own way.
We have to be awake,
attentive,
alert,
and aware
wherever we are.
What are you doing
to wake yourself up
today?

06/08/2017 —

Republicans tell people
what they want to hear
and do nothing for them.
And, the people do not get
the disconnect
because they are told
what they want to hear
and want to believe it is so–
and the alternative to false hope
is hopelessness,
and they cannot bear the truth
of that reality.
Voting Republican
is kidding themselves
about the value of a lie,
because they don’t have
what it takes to face the truth
and grow up.
The truth is that black people,
and LGBTQ’s,
and immigrants,
and Muslims,
and all the people they hate
need the same kind of help
they need,
and a coalition among them all
is their only real hope.
But.
They had rather go to hell
than go to heaven with Those People.
And Republicans know that,
and laugh all the way to re-election.
Racism (and all the other “isms”)
is the Republican ticket
to victory on voting day.
That’s what got Trump
where he is today.
It’s the only thing Republicans
have going for them.

06/08/2017 —

We have to be lucky, but.
We can put ourselves
in position to be lucky,
and let happen
what happens
without making too much
of whatever that is.

06/08/2017 — Nothing is more basic to our identity
than what we care about,
and what we do not care about.
What we care about is who we are.
Not what we say we care about.
We can clearly care about the right things,
and we can clearly care about the wrong things.
We can care about things
we have no business caring about–
and not care about things
that are essential to our good
and to the good of those about us.
The task of maturation
is to grow into those
who care deeply
about the right things–
about the things that
must be cared for.
We are to spend our life
learning what those things are
and learning how to care for them.
What is worth our time and attention?
How do we serve it with our life?
How do we decide what is worth caring about?
How do we get ourselves to care about it?
How do we know what is worth our life?
How do we place ourselves in its service,
and honor it with our devotion,
allegiance
and loyalty
all our life long?
If you can find better questions to answer,
answer them,
too!

06/08/2017 — My wife and I can agree
that it is 74 degrees in the house,
and disagree about
whether that is comfortable or hot.
You would never convince me
that it is hot
or convince her
that it is comfortable.
Things are for each of us
what they appear to be to us.
I have my ideas about
Republicans,
Jesus,
and refined sugar.
What I have to say
about those
(and other) things
is my considered position.
It is where I stand.
Other people stand somewhere else.
Betsy DeVos and I
stand poles apart
on the issue of the equal rights of all children
to quality education devoid of discrimination
on any level regarding anything–
and of the federal government’s place
in guaranteeing those rights.
My wife and I can work out
our disagreement over the temperature setting.
Betsy needs to understand
that discrimination is unconstitutional,
that it is the role of government
to enforce the Constitution,
and that we do not get to pick
which laws we can ignore.
Things are for each of us
what they appear to be to us,
but.
We both have to abide by the law,
no matter how we see things
or think they should be.

06/08/2017 — We can decide–
indeed, must–
what is right for us,
where we stand
and how we are going
to live our life,
WITHIN THE FRAMEWORK OF THE CONSTITUTION!
The Constitution is non-negotiable.
Even though some Republican-controlled
state legislatures think
they are beyond the jurisdiction
of the Constitution,
and the federal government
in its role as arbitrator and enforcer
of the Constitution,
and require the constant
supervision of the courts
to keep them within the bounds,
not only of the Constitution,
but also of human decency
and civil order,
the Rule of Law–
and that would be Constitutional Law–
keeps us solvent as a United States of America.
We all live and work and have our being
WITHIN THE FRAMEWORK OF THE CONSTITUTION!
The point is too easily lost,
set aside,
dismissed,
disregarded,
discounted,
ignored–
and that is how we got
where we are today.

06/08/2017 — We belong in different places,
and to different groups of people,
in each stage of development
throughout our life.
Life changes us.
And, if it doesn’t,
we are “arrested”
in one of the early stages
of development,
and sit,
saying the same things,
to the same people,
forever–
always missing the point
of being alive,
which is allowing ourselves
to be pulled forth,
against our will,
to our own surprise and consternation,
by the forces come to meet
and challenge us
in the conditions and circumstances
of each stage of life.
We are built to be different
over time–
by realizing who we are,
again and again,
in the grip of inspiration
and revelation
born of our emerging self
through its encounters
with the physical universe.
The places we belong,
and the people we belong to,
and the ideas that belong to us,
will change,
as we change
though the eternal rounds
of recognizing
“the face that was ours
before we were born.”

06/09/2017 — Life changes us.
If we aren’t changing,
we might as well be dead,
and are dead
for all the good being alive
does us,
or anyone around us.
We are changing our minds
about what is important
all of the time.
The things we refuse
to change our minds about
are the things that choke out
the life that is trying
to be lived.
When we pride ourselves
on being firm and solid
in our convictions,
we are saying
we are perfect just as we are.
Our life has a mind of its own,
and will gladly demonstrate for us
just how imperfect we are
by allowing us to “age out”
of perfection into ruin and wreckage,
crazy old people railing
about the world that has
left us behind.

06/09/2017— Day Lilies 2017 03 – Indian Land, South Carolina, June 4, 2016

It doesn’t matter what you believe.
It matters what you do
and how you do it.
You will not be tested on your theology.
If there is a test at all
it will consist of two questions:
What was important to you?
How did you make manifest
what was important to you
in the way you lived your life?
Theology is not important.
The way you live is important.
Believe anything you want to believe–
anything it takes to believe–
in order to do the thing that needs to be done–
the right thing,
the good and decent thing,
the proper and fitting thing,
the thing that needs you to do it,
that needs somebody to do it,
in each situation as it arises,
all your life long.
Knowing what that thing is
takes living with your eyes open,
with the eyes of your heart open,
to the time and place of your living.
It will not be the same thing
in all of the times and places of your living.
It will always be the thing that is called for,
but it may never be called for again.
Jesus raised the dead,
and left the dead to bury the dead.
Jesus forgave a guilty woman,
and cursed an innocent fig tree.
Jesus healed on the Sabbath,
and cried out,
“No sign will be given to you
except the sign of Jonah!”
You never knew with Jesus.
You never know with you,
what you will do next
in response to where you are.
Be like the wind
that blows where it will,
free to do what you determine
needs to be done
wherever you are.

06/09/2017— We are the ground
under our own feet,
the light for our
own path,
the stone our builder-self
rejects,
the pearl of great price
picked over again and again
by the self-who-knows-best within.
We wait for the courage
to trust ourselves
to know what we know,
and to believe in who we are
and what we have to give.
If not now, when?
If not here, where?

06/09/2017 — There is a sense
in which our lot in life
is our cross to bear,
but beyond that,
there is another cross
with our name on it–
the cross of being who we are
where we are;
the cross of bringing ourselves forth
within the lot
that is ours to bear.
The heroic deed
is to be more than
we think we can manage–
to over-achieve
in a place where nothing can be done–
to refuse to settle
for the course of least resistance,
for less than we are capable of being/doing.
Over the course of our life,
we are always coming up against
some form of internal opposition
that blocks our path
like a Cyclops of our own making:
Inertia.
Lethargy.
Disinclination.
Maybe tomorrow.
Maybe next time.
Maybe never.
What?
What is the first step?
Take it!
Pick up those crosses!
Start walking!

05/09/2017 — There is never anything more to it than this:
See what you look at.
Hear what you listen to.
Feel what you feel.
Touch what you touch.
Smell what you smell.
Taste what you taste.
Experience what you experience.
Think what you think.
Know what you know.
Be who you are,
and who you also are,
in ways that are fitting, proper and appropriate
in each situation as it arises.
Do what needs to be done–
what needs you to do it–
with the gifts that are yours to give.
Without having to have
a particular outcome.
For the rest of your life.

Being okay in a situation that is not okay
positions us to swing the situation toward
being more okay than it would be without us.
It is the turning point,
the pivot point,
the fulcrum,
“the still point of the turning world”
(T.S. Eliot).
From there, things are possible
that would not be possible
from any other place.
The key to being there
is having no investment in any outcome;
is not having to have anything happen;
is to be able to not-strive for
an idea of how things ought to be–
to not-serve an ideology–
to not push/shove/force our way–
to not have a way
in a “Thy will, not mine be done” kind of way,
with “Thy” being the will–
the good–
of the moment,
of the situation,
of the time that is at hand.
It is to be of service to the moment,
to the need of the moment,
to what needs to happen in the moment,
without thought of gain,
or profit,
or benefit,
or advantage.
What is being called for?
What is missing?
What is crying out to be seen,
heard,
done,
said?
Listen!
Look!
See!
Hear!
With the eyes and ears of your heart.
And trust yourself to the urgency
arising from knowing what you know.

06/10/2017 — We live in perilous times,
with all the high values under attack–
liberty, justice, equality, compassion, kindness, grace,
tenderness, affection, good will, good faith, civility…
Hatred is on the rise,
emboldened by the appalling shamelessness of Donald Trump.
Children bully and shame other children
following Trump’s example,
using Trump’s words.
Our work is to remember
and to live out of
the core of what is essential to life
as human beings–
all of the old values above
and the others that belong with them,
non-violence, brave hearts, loyalty, allegiance, devotion,
goodness, beauty, truth…
Walk through the world each day,
unbowed and unbroken,
refusing to be pulled off the path
by the madness on every side.
Be a light in the dark wood.
An oasis in the barren wasteland.
A cup of cold water in presence of parching hatred.
A place where people can find shelter for their souls,
and “recover from the past,
and store up for the future.”
We have lived through perilous times before,
and carry the DNA of the species.
We are not alone,
but are surrounded by “a great cloud of witnesses,”
who have seen it all before,
and are present with us
to uphold and enable,
and urge us on,
whispering to us:
“You are the hope of the world.”

People world-wide fall out
along a continuum
of Mindfulness/Wakefulness/Maturation,
and tend to gather in groups
that reflect the degree
of Mindfulness/Wakefulness/Maturation
of each person in the group.
We are comfortable with people
who talk/think/act like we do–
and are uncomfortable with people
who are too much ahead of us,
or behind us,
on the Mindfulness/Wakefulness/Maturation scale.
Rural, small town, USA
has its place on the scale,
and urban, up town, USA
has its pace on the scale–
and they are not the same place.
I would be interested to see
how people fall out
in terms of their interests,
hobbies,
sports loves,
education level,
religious preference, etc.
And, I would be interested to know
how we might increase the level
of Mindfulness/Wakefulness/Maturation
on national and international levels.
Watching Jon Kabat-Zinn videos
and practicing Mindfulness Meditation
wouldn’t hurt.

06/11/2017 — We all are–
each one of us is–
The Anointed One,
called to be who we are,
set apart before we were born
to be the gift we are
given to the world.
How well we are received
is not relevant to the question:
Will we honor the gift?
Will we serve the gift?
Will we incarnate the gift?
Regardless of the effort
and the outcome?
Will we despise the gift?
Dishonor the gift?
Reject the gift?
Deny,
Discount,
Disregard,
Ignore
the gift?
We are–
our life is–
the answer to the question
asked at our birth,
by our birth.

06/12/2017 — Our myth is what we tell ourselves
about the way things are
that enables us to live
with the way things are.
The myths by which we live
must support us through
our personal crises in life.
They have to sustain us
and enable us to go forward
with our lives.
When we find what sustains us
through those crises,
we find our myth.
What is it that supports us
in the face of total disaster?
To know that, is to know your myth.
A personal crisis
will strip us of all
we thought to be life-sustaining,
and force us to do the work
of creating a truly life-sustaining myth
out of the ruins of false claims
and empty promises.
The lesson of those ruins is:
How we have been told things are
is not how things are.
Now, what say we about
how things are,
and what to do about it?
Our answer has to come
out of the truth of our reflection
of own experience
in conjunction
with our own creative imagination
and the bedrock
of our own authority
that leads to new realizations
and new ways of living,
of responding to what happens.
It is like this:
the sun rises, or sets,
and we do not stand before
the sunrise or the sunset asking,
“How am I supposed to see this?”
“How am I supposed to feel about it?”
‘What am I supposed to think?”
“What is it supposed to mean to me?”
“What is my response supposed to be?”
We stand before a sunrise or a sunset,
and our response is our response.
Our perception arises
out of our own perspective,
and our reflection on the allness
of our experience
transforms our outlook and attitude
and graces us with new ways of seeing
based on the interaction of our “noble heart”
with the reality of our life experience.

06/12/2017 — On the final page of his four volume masterwork on the history of religion/mythology, “The Masks of God,” Joseph Campbell says:

“The free association of men and women of like spirit…(is) in the modern world, the only honest (possibility): each the creative center of authority for (himself/herself)… The individual (must) anticipate and activate in (himself/herself) the centers of (his/her) own creative imagination, out of which (his/her) own myth and life-building “Yes because” may then unfold…In the end…the guide within will be (his/her) own noble heart alone, and the guide without, the image of beauty, the radiance of divinity, that wakes in (his/her) heart amor: the deepest, inmost seed of (his/her) nature, consubstantial with the process of the All, “thus come.” And in this life-creative adventure the criterion of achievement will be, as in every one of the tales herein reviewed, the courage to let go of the past, with its truths, its goals, its dogmas of “meaning,” and its gifts: to die to the world and to come to birth from within.”

06/12/2017 — Attaining enlightenment,
and achieving full/true human-being-hood
will surpass all of the
categories of superlative
I’m sure, but.
It won’t do anything for us.
There is still the garbage to take out,
the mopping and the dusting,
the other chores,
the bills to pay–
and the way of escape
from the monotony and drudgery
will be removed
and replaced by the
compassionate receptivity
of the present moment
just as it is,
regardless of what it is.
Is that a trade-off we really
want to make?
Apparently not,
for a large number of us.

06/12/2017 — We are drawn to,
resonate with,
certain people.
Are strengthened
and enlivened by
certain people.
Enjoy the company of,
and are comforted by,
certain people.
…
Why some and not all?
Why anyone and not everyone?
These are mystical experiences.
Encounters with the spiritual aspect of life.
Evidence of more than meets the eye,
of more than words can say.
Proof that the physical dimension
is not the only dimension,
and that logic and reason
are not the only guides
through the Dark Wood.

There are no shortcuts
on the road to life,
on the road of life.
No one can do our work for us,
can do the work for us,
can tell us what to do
and how to do it–
except in the most general,
vague,
imprecise
and useless
kind of way.
The way to God
is the way of God.
We have to be God
to know God.
And we do not get there
by thinking
or by believing.
Godliness is not mental.
It is “of the heart,”
and heart and life are one.
When we live without heart
it shows.
The spiritual journey
is the distance
from the head
to the heart.
Heart leads to
and flows from
the life we live.
The way to the heart
is the way of the heart.
Heart is in how we live.
Heart is in what we do.
Heart is in how we do it.
Until heart and life are one,
we are wearing our hat
looking for our hat.
We are living
to get to the place
of being who we are
and being right about
who that is–
with compassion
for ourselves
and all living things.

You can call it luck,
or you can call it grace,
or providence.
It is the same thing:
The ground of existence.
The fundamental fact of life.
We are all “just lucky to be here.”
Some people are forever of the opinion
that “Luck has noting to do with it!
We are all here by the providence
and grace of God!”
My quick retort is,
“Aren’t we lucky
that God is so gracious
and providential?”
Luck comes in two forms,
good and bad
(Three if you count
“None at all”).
The interesting thing here
is that luck is like quicksilver,
or an optical illusion,
or the fastest shape shifter
of all time.
Good luck becomes bad luck
in a wink.
And bad luck becomes good luck
in a similar fashion.
You can’t pin luck down.
Now, you are lucky,
now you are not,
now you are…
Nothing is as it was,
or will be,
or everything is,
depending on your point of view,
and the time of day
(Or, of your life)
you take the photo.
So, if you think you
are in the middle
of the worst things can be,
keep living.
Everything changes in time.
Sometimes,
in a way that will make this
seem like the best of times.

06/14/2017 — What I am about to write
applies to me, but.
My deep hunch is
that you could, right now,
be writing the same thing
about you.
I am confident it reflects
the truth about all of you
who are reading this.
Those whom it would not
describe would probably
have never visited this site,
and would be long since gone
if they had.

My life could be easier
than it is,
and a lot more fun,
with less to do
that I don’t like/want to do,
and more to do that I
do like/want to do.
It is often a grind
to get up again
and go meet what is waiting.
And I am usually not in the mood
to do it.
So, I feel worse about my life
than I have any right to feel.
Over the years,
I have amassed a hell of a fine record
of meeting challenges.
I’ve done some things
as well as Jesus, the Buddha,
or the Dalai Lama
could have done them–
and some things better
(Let’s see the Dalai Lama
change a diaper, for example,
a rank, ripe, godawful one).
I have met challenges in the past,
and will meet them in the future.
I am confident in my ability
to do that.
No matter how I feel about
how I’m doing,
I’m doing very well.
And.
So.
Are.
You.

We have to work together
to serve the good of the whole.
When the good of a part
asserts itself over the good of the whole,
it’s a problem.
Whose good is served
by the good we call good?
Whose good is discounted,
dismissed,
disregarded,
denied,
despised,
ignored?
Partisan politics,
partisan religion,
partisan practices of any kind,
where by the good of the many
is subservient to the good of the few,
and what is right
is defined as what is right
in the eyes of the few
at the expense of what is right
in the eyes of the many,
is not the ground of democracy,
and cannot sustain an environment
in which people are free
to find their own way
and express their own truth
while honoring and serving
the good of the whole.
How much for the individual
and how much for the group
is the dynamic dialectic
that limits the individual
and restricts the group–
“the slippery slope,”
“the dangerous path,”
“the razor’s edge,”
that defines,
shapes,
and governs
our life together.
Without good faith
and self-transparency,
we have no hope
of pulling it off–
and everything rides
on our pulling it off!

06/15/2017 — The slippery slope,”
“the dangerous path,”
“the razor’s edge”
is being the authority
for our own life
and being right
about what we do.
It is knowing what we are doing
in one situation after another
in which
“Who can be so wise?”
Everything rides on
our knowing what we are doing
and we cannot possibly
know what we are doing.
So.
We start with knowing
that we do not know
what we are doing,
and proceed from there
along “the slippery slope,”
“the dangerous path,”
“the razor’s edge.”
Looking,
listening,
inquiring,
in order to
see,
hear,
and understand.
Slowly grasping
over the course of our life
what is happening,
what is being asked of us
and what needs to be done in response.
We get better at living mindfully
by practicing the art of mindfulness
to the best of our ability
at each stage along the way.
The key principles of mindfulness are:
Seeing what we look at.
Being where we are.
Fully present with this moment right now,
without judgment or opinion,
with compassion, kindness and awareness.
Knowing what we know,
and waiting to see
what that knowledge
asks of us
and where things go from there.
Where we repeat
the same process
endlessly forever
along “the slippery slope,”
“the dangerous path,”
“the razor’s edge.”

06/15/2017 — People have to be heard!
Nothing is more empowering
than being listened to with understanding.
Carl Jung said,
“The reason for evil in the world
is that people are not able
to tell their stories.”
And, they are not able
to tell their stories
because there is no one to listen.
Listening with understanding
is the foundation
to all livable futures.
Listening with understanding
is as simple
as being mindfully aware
of what all is being said.
Listening is mindful awareness
extended to another person–
it is being mindfully aware
of the other person,
in a way that enables
the other person
to be mindfully aware
of herself/himself.
The gift of mindful awareness
is that proverbial gift
“that goes on giving.”
If you are going to be anything,
be mindfully aware of everything.

06/15/2017 — The path for Christianity
is to ditch its theology
and reclaim its symbols
by updating its myth.
For example:
It could talk about Christianity
as the way between
the two gardens,
Eden and Gethsemane–
metaphors for doing it our way,
living out of our idea
of how our life ought to be lived,
discovering the emptiness
and lostness
of that wasteland,
dying to that orientation
and coming to life
by living in collaboration
with our psyche/self within
in a “thy will not mine be done” kind of way.
We live away from thinking our way
into our life
to living mindfully, compassionately, aware
of our life’s need of the gifts we bear,
and look for ways to incarnate them
in each situation that arises,
for the good of the whole.
The church then becomes a way-station
on the spiritual journey,
offering hope and direction
through good times and bad.
This is a paradigm waiting to be initiated.
What’s the holdup?

Let’s say you hate black people,
and women,
and immigrants,
and Muslims,
and LGBTQ’s,
and Latinos,
and poor people,
and people with disabilities–
and even if you say
you don’t hate anyone,
but they can’t tell the difference
by the way you treat them,
or, you vote for someone
who does hate them,
you may as well hate them,
and you are only kidding yourself
in saying that you don’t.
Or if you hate the people
who hate all these people…
Where are you going to go
to exorcise your hatred?
How are you going
to cure your hatred?
How are you going
to be free of hatred?
What are you going to do
about your hatred?
No one can do
anything about your hatred
but you.
If you are waiting
for all the people you hate
to disappear,
you will die hating
all of the people
who haven’t disappeared.
Your hatred is up to you.
What are you going to do
about it?

06/16/2017 — We have to guard
our own solitude,
mine the silence
for the gold,
and be present
in each moment
with compassionate
non-judgment–
in order to meet
the moment
as it needs to be met,
and let things
take their course.
There is nothing
difficult about this,
it is merely distasteful,
going, as it does,
against the current
of the popular idea
regarding how things
are to be done:
With a resolute will
an irresistible force,
and unrelenting determination.

06/16/2017 — Alexis Carrel said,
“We are both the marble and the sculptor.”
The chisel and the compelling vision.
The conscious ego and the unconscious psyche.
Come together to incarnate ourselves
in the world of time and space.
We make no progress
because we devote no
attention and effort
to the project—
and die without living
the life that was our potential
at birth.
It’s time to get to work
on ourselves.

We don’t choose
what we care about.
We don’t care about
what we care about
because we ought to,
because someone told us to,
because it would be smart to,
because it will look good on our record.
All of that results in posturing,
not caring.
We can pretend to care about
anything,

We can say we care about it all.
But.
We have no control at all
over the things we actually
care about.
What are the things
you actually care about?
How do you
exhibit,
express,
incarnate,
manifest
the depth and degree
of your caring.
How do you make apparent
what you care about?
How would anyone know
you care about what you care about?
We are here to care about
what we care about
in visible,
tangible,
concrete ways.
Caring about the things we care about
will lead us into
living the life that is our life to live.
Climb aboard that beast–
if you dare–
and tell them
to open the chute,
you are going
for the ride of your life.

06/17/2017 —

In the Bible, the Preacher (Ecclesiastes),
says, “There is a time
for every purpose
under heaven.”
This is the Tao.
This is Karma.
When things are happening
in accord with their purpose
and their time,
things are happening
in accord with the Tao,
and things are aligned with,
and producing,
good Karma.
Then the shoe maker
is making shoes,
the taxi driver
is driving a cab,
the poet is writing poetry,
the civil engineer is
building bridges…
When things are out of sync
with their purpose and their time,
the shoe maker
is writing poetry,
the poet is building bridges,
the taxi driver is making shoes,
the civil engineer is driving a cab…
We begin to turn things
back to their natural flow
when we sit quietly
and reflect on
what is ours to do,
and when, and how,
best to do it.
Putting ourselves in accord
with our own time and purpose,
creates momentum
that shifts the world
toward balance and peace.
One person in sync with herself
influences harmony
wherever she goes.

06/18/2017— Day Lilies 2017 04 — Indian Land, South Carolina, June 3, 2017

Joseph Campbell said,
“Where you stumble and fall,
there lies the gold!”
(or words to that effect).
All those mistakes
and snafu’s,
the false starts
and wrong turns,
the failures,
flops,
faux pas’s…
All the things we
we have done
and not done
we remember
so vividly
with such shame
and remorse…
All that we wish
we had done differently…
plays a part
in who we have become,
and who we might yet be.
The things we learn
are not all easy things to learn.
The things we know
do not all come to us
in smooth and gentle ways.
Aeschylus, writing some years
before Campbell, said,
“He who learns must suffer.
And even in our sleep pain
that cannot forget
falls drop by drop
upon the heart,
and in our own despair,
against our will,
comes wisdom to us
by the awful grace of God.”
It is a terrible path
to our own humanity,
made more terrible–
unforgivably so–
by refusing to walk it
and claim, thereby, the gold.

06/18/2017 — There is no getting everything in place
so that we can relax
and enjoy our life.
There is only meeting
the challenges presented
by each present moment
for as long as there are moments.
Do not think this is about
getting somewhere.
We are not going anywhere.
There is no progress
in terms of getting everyone
to agree to live with justice and kindness
in relationship with each other.
Progress is measured
in our willingness and ability
to get up and do what needs
us to do it
in each situation as it arises
no matter what.
We will never run out of moments
that need what we have to offer.
Take heart!
We will never run out of
what we have to give!

There is nothing wrong with us–
as individuals,
as a nation,
as a world–
that growing up
wouldn’t make better.
Growing up
is always
the unacknowledged option.
The one we never consider,
and always ignore
in favor of finding ways
to impose our way
on everything
standing in our way.
We will do anything
to avoid growing up.

06/20/2017 — This is Karen Handel’s
(the Republican running
for election to Georgia’s
sixth district) core message:
“We are going to rock
Nancy Pelosi’s world!”
No word about any of the social issues
facing the people on the list
of the marginalized and maligned,
ignored, disregarded and discarded
throughout the country.
Just show Nancy Pelosi who is boss!
It is a sick message,
and a telling exposure
of “the Republican Mind.”

06/20/2017 — My bias,
my prejudice,
my bigotry,
my political profiling
tells me that
the people who will
vote for Karen Handel
in Georgia’s 6th District today
will not have anything to worry about
regarding losing their health care,
will not be Muslim
or have anything at stake
in the disdain and disregard
for Muslims nationwide,
will not care anything at all
about the future of LGBTQ rights,
or about women’s rights,
or about the rights of people
to a livable wage,
or about the rights of disabled people,
or the rights of children,
or about the future of public education,
or about helping students,
with the costs of a college education…
They will be concerned about
their own safety and security,
their personal comfort and peace of mind.
And they will think,
all evidence to the contrary tossed aside,
that Republicans will keep them safer
than Democrats will.
Tossing evidence to the contrary aside
is what Republicans really do best.

Here’s a creed for the Non-Subscribing Church
of What’s Happening Now:

I believe in mindful,
compassionate,
non-judgmental,
awareness
of the just-as-it-is-ness
and the all-ness
of each present moment.
I believe in liberty, justice and equality;
in beauty, creativity and imagination;
in kindness, good faith, and goodwill;
in goodness, mercy, and grace;
in tenderness, intimacy, and vulnerability;
in noble hearts and unquenchable spirits;
in empathetic understanding of self and others;
in self-reflection and self-transparency;
in seeing what we look at and knowing what we know;
in experiencing our experience and loving what we love;
in caring about what we care about,
and living in ways that make our little heart sing–
while honoring the right of all people
to a life that expresses and incarnates
the best they are capable of being
in the time and place of their living.

To be edited, expanded and enlarged
in order to say what needs to be said
as it occurs to us
over the course of our life.
This reflects my idea of religion at its best.

06/20/2017 — I am intensely,
and perhaps eternally,
interested in the process
by which we change our mind.
I have changed my mind
more times than I can remember,
and typically am aware of changing it
several times a week–
but.
I have never forced my mind
to change against its will.
I cannot talk myself into thinking
contrary to the way I think.
My thinking–my mind–changes
on its own,
without my making it happen.
It as though my mind
has a mind of its own.
My mind changes me.
I do not change my mind.
I “wake up,” so to speak,
and discover that
my mind has changed.
Upon reflection,
it seems to me that
experience changes my mind–
that my mind experiences
reality in a way
that shifts something
internal to it,
and it changes,
changing me (my behavior) along with it.
My place in the process (I think),
is allowing my mind the freedom/right
to its own experience of reality.
I do not sit in judgment/control
of my mind’s perception of reality,
of its perspective of reality.
It sees what it sees (what it looks at),
and not what it is supposed to see.
My maternal grandfather–
who was person most locked into
seeing only what he allowed himself to see,
exactly as he had always seen it,
that I have ever known–
did not have the freedom of his own experience.
He experienced everything exactly
as he had always experienced it.
If anything new came along,
he treated it as he always treated
anything new that came along,
throwing it on the trash pile
of things never to think about again.
His mind never changed.
His way of life never changed.
I am here, in part,
to redeem his life.
I don’t try to control my mind.
I try to keep up with my mind,
and let it show me
what I need to know/think/do
here/now.
And, I wonder how other people
experience the process
of their mind changing.
It is a curiosity that keeps me going.

06/20/2017 — In addition to being
intently and eternally
interested in how our mind changes,
I am also taken
with how our strongly held beliefs
all are self-validating–
they are true
because we know they are true
based on our own experience.
This is the ground of all superstitions,
and all religious belief.
If you “take anything on faith,”
it will be validated in your own experience
over time.
Take the statements…
“All women are ____”
“All men are ____”
“All black people,
LGBTQ people,
Latinos
Muslims
Etc.
are ___”
Believe them fervently,
and they will be validated in your own experience.
It is because, of course,
we become biased,
prejudiced,
bigoted,
in the service of our own beliefs,
and “look” for the ways our experience
confirms them,
while “overlooking” the ways
our experience refutes them.
It is a trick we play on ourselves–
a trick that becomes
a determining factor
in how we live our life.
Once we believe something,
we are not free to disbelieve it,
and interfere with/deny
our mind’s experience of its experience,
refusing to allow
evidence to the contrary
to enter our field of view
and change our mind about what we believe.
We become “sot in our ways.”
And beyond all hope of awakening,
transformation,
and redemption.

06/20/2017 — Jesus’ injunction to
“Judge not,”
can be understood
as a plea
to be open to our experience.
Judging an experience
cuts us off from the experience,
prevents us
from experiencing the experience,
keeps us
from knowing more than we know,
by settling for knowing
what the experience is
as we render our judgment upon it.
“Judge not,”
means “Keep an open mind,”
“Wait and see,”
“Let life be your teacher,”
“Don’t think you know enough
to stop thinking
about anything!”

We do what we do
in season and out of season,
around the clock,
in all weather conditions,
whether we feel up to it or not,
whether we are in the mood for it or not,
whether it’s working or not,
whether it makes any sense or not,
whether it does any good or not,
whether it makes a difference or not
because it is who we are,
and it needs us to do it,
and nothing matters more
than being true to our own core
and standing fast
on the bedrock of our own identity
in being who we are
in the time and place of our living.
If we are not going to believe in
what we believe in
and exhibit our loyalty, allegiance and devotion
to the work that is our work
and the values that are out values,
we make a travesty
of believing,
working
and valuing,
and show ourselves to be hollow people
drifting aimlessly,
mindlessly,
through the wasteland
of greed and hopelessness.
Ain’t no damn Cyclops
going to throw us off the path,
no matter how many there are
or how often they block the way!

06/21/2017 — Carl Jung said,
“Protection and security
are only valuable
if they do not cramp life excessively.”
Safety is not the highest value.
Being fully alive
and open to life
is the highest value.
Living with all that is within us
for as long as life is possible
is the highest value.
Holding nothing back
and giving all that is ours to give
in every time and place,
condition and circumstance,
of our living
is the highest value.
Dancing with our fear
and stepping into the unknown
in the company of all
that comes with us
into the wonder
of every moment
is the highest value.
We don’t know what
is going to happen,
or what we are going
to do about it,
but we are going
to find out,
and can’t wait to see!

06/21/2017 — No matter how bad it gets,
we still have to deal with it–
and how we deal with it
makes all the difference.
Hope is not what we have,
it is what we do–
it is how we live.
We live hopefully,
defiantly,
courageously,
determinedly,
in the service
of the best we can imagine,
in allegiance
to the highest values
we can envision,
in each situation
as it arises,
all our life long.
That does not change.
Conditions change.
Circumstances change.
The environment and atmosphere
in which we live
fluctuate with the times,
but we remain grounded
in our vision of the good,
in our sense of what is right,
just, beautiful,
and worthy of what we have to give.
When in doubt,
stick with who you are
and what you are about.
Our identity is our foundation.
Our values are our guide.
No matter how hard it gets,
it is never more difficult
than being who we are,
doing what is ours to do,
in every situation as it arises,
all our life long.

06/21/2017 — It is easier for us to believe
what we believe
if we associate
with people who
share our beliefs.
Ratification, verification,
validation, confirmation
repeated over time
normalizes our beliefs,
makes them familiar,
comfortable,
right and true.
White supremacists
hang out with white supremacists
listen to white supremacists
and read what white supremacists write.
Same goes for evangelical Christians
and liberal Democrats.
What we believe is a function of,
an extension of,
the company we keep–
and the company we keep
is a reflection of what we believe.
Mindful (compassionate, non-judgmental) awareness
changes things–
across the board,
around the circle
(and around the world).
Introspection,
self-reflection,
self-examination
in conjunction
with “other” and “outer”
inspection,
reflection,
examination
produces realization
formed in and by awareness,
and that transforms perspective
and enlarges perception,
grows us toward maturation,
and alters reality
by clarifying and deepening
our comprehension/understanding
of what is happening
and needs to happen.
If you want to change something,
become intently,
intensely,
aware of it
and of everything associated with it.

06/21/2017 — The magic lies in how
we respond, relate, react
to what happens–
to what is happening–
and how what is happening
impacts us,
and how we impact it.
The magic resides
at the interface
between ourselves
and our life–
between our ego consciousness
and our psychic unconsciousness–
and enables
the dance,
the flow,
of life.
We assist the magic,
or resist it,
and that is the turn
that tells the tale.

06/21/2017 —

All religions require
their adherents to
“take it on faith”
that the creeds, doctrines, premise’s
of the religion are true/actual/factual/real.
Taking something “on faith”
comes down to
taking someone’s word for it
that it is so.
It is believing that someone
knows what they are talking about
regarding what to believe,
and believing it
because they say so.
They say,
“Believing it is so
is the way to
knowing that it is.”
Of course.
That’s the way horoscopes work.
Believing that it is not so
is the way to
knowing that it isn’t.
Belief in anything is groundless.
Faith in anything is without evidence.
We always believe as much
in spite of something as
because of something.
We know prayer works
because someone prayed
and was healed.
Never mind that cemeteries
are filled with people
who had a different outcome.
So, how do we know what to believe?
Knowing and believing
operate on different frequencies.
The kind of knowing that
stems from believing
is the kind that makes no inquires,
and runs no experiments,
and tests no hypotheses.
It’s the kind that says,
“It doesn’t matter what the facts are,
we know what the truth is.”
All belief is self-validating,
and arguing over which set of beliefs
is True Belief
is like arguing over the meaning
of an ink blot.

06/21/2017— If Christianity would dump its theology
and reclaim/reinterpret
its symbols,
what a difference that would make
in the world!
But.
That won’t happen from the top down.
The flow goes from the bottom up.
But.
Even that is such a difficult struggle,
people opt for simply walking away.
That’s such a shame,
because “the symbols of transformation”
(Carl Jung)
are all “right there.”
Communion and Baptism are two good ones.
Throw out the theology surrounding both,
and you are left with
bread, wine, and water.
We couldn’t ask for three better ones.
Bread:
“The bread of affliction is the bread of life.”
Wine:
“The cup of suffering is the cup of salvation.”
Water:
“Everyone is born of water (embryonic fluid) and of spirit (the mysterious source of life and being).”
You could build a life
around the exploration
of those symbols
and the implications
they have for the life
we live–
no theology needed.

06/21/2017 — Understanding something
doesn’t mean we will be able
to explain it.
Sheldon Kopp said,
“Some things can be experienced,
but not understood–
and some things can be understood,
but not explained.”
We have to relax ourselves
into some things,
and allow them to carry us
wherever they are going.
Probably,
most things are that way.

I weep for the complexity of our lives.
For our work of balancing the contradictions,
managing the offsetting opposites,
reconciling the irreconcilable,
bearing the pain of polarities,
getting up each day
to face the mutually exclusive
incompatibilities that form and shape,
bend and contort
who we are–
and who we also are.
We are the best working agreement
we can manage.
It is no wonder we are depressed,
alcoholic,
drug repositories,
religious fanatics,
symptomatic,
strung out between
our wits end
and the end of our rope.
Where would we be
without our addictions
and our denial?
And yet, and yet…
In the darkest night of that denial,
with all the threatening light
shut tightly out
so that no one–
especially not us–
knows how it is with us,
divided as we are
through the heart of our being,
something–
someone–

We know.
And cannot abide our knowing.
But.
It isn’t like we are the only one.
The entire history of humanity
(and of our literature, music and art)
is the story of the secrets we keep
about our Other Sides.
What to do with the truth of us all?
I recommend weeping–
and opening ourselves thereby
to the truth of our Other Sides,
bearing mindfully that truth
through the days,
holding in our awareness all that we are,
without denying or excommunicating
or demonizing or shaming,
simply receiving the truth
and all of its contraries,
and working out
as well as we are able
the compromises and concessions
required to keep
the whole together
and functioning as a unit
in the world
of normal,
apparent,
reality.

06/22/2017 — The Republicans’ one-trick pony
is demonizing the Democrats.
Remove all references to Democrats
from their vocabulary,
and they have nothing to say.
They demonize the Democrats
for being closet Socialists
(And “everybody knows,” they say,
“that Socialism is Satanic to the core!”).
They demonize both Clintons.
They demonize Barack Obama.
They demonize Nancy Pelosi.
They demonize gun control
(which they posit as a Democrat conspiracy).
They demonize all social programs
(see above re. socialism).
They demonize abortion.
They demonize homosexuality.
They demonize poverty
as evidencing a lack of self-discipline
and a will to succeed.
Republicans offer themselves
as the only fitting alternative
to the Demonic Democrats.
After a generation of repeating the mantra,
all they have to do is stand before
their constituents
and shout,
“At least, I won’t take your guns away!”
And walk off with an automatic 40% of the vote.
Democrats can claim another 40%,
which leaves 10% for Third Party candidates
and 10% who control the outcome.
Democrats have to stop being defensive
and make their case
for Democracy,
civil and human rights
to the uncommitted 10%
who carry the future of the country
with them into the voting booth.

06/22/2017 — Democrats are serving/selling
Liberty, Justice, Equality,
and all the values implied by
and contingent upon The Big Three
(Compassion, grace, kindness, truth,
transparency, forthrightness, good faith, etc.).
Democrats serve/sell civil and human rights.
Democrats serve/sell the fundamental basics
of Democracy:
The Rule of Law; The Separation of Powers;
The Authority of the Constitution;
Liberty and Justice for All;
Of The People, By The People, For The People…
And if the majority of the American people
won’t vote for Democrats
representing the principles
of American Democracy,
then God help us all.

We do not do what we do to achieve some goal.
We do what we do to serve our purpose,
our values,
our principles,
our character.
We do what we do to be who we are
whether it does “any good” or not.
We do not care what our outcomes are,
or may be.
We care who we are
and how that is to be best incarnated
in the time and place of our living–
in each situation as it arises–
all our life long.
We live to be who we are
here and now!
That is our motivation and our goal.
We are the purpose of our living.
We live to be ourselves,
to express ourselves,
and become ourselves
in the effort we make
to identify, understand, and be who only we can be
in the life we are living,
in the times in which we live.
In order to pull this off,
we require the right blend,
the right balance,
the right mix
of solitude and socialization,
of engagement and disengagement,
of experience and reflection on experience,
of silence and conversation.
My bet is that most of us
are under-nourished
on the quiet side of the equation,
and just want someone
to turn up the music
most of the time
to make our mind
quit making us crazy.
To give us some goal,
so that we don’t have to know
who we are,
or hear ourselves think.

06/23/2017 — Watching the United States government
work against the people of the US
and of the entire globe,
is like watching the glaciers melt
and the polar ice pack
cave into the sea.
It is inevitable, unstoppable, heartbreaking–
and we did it to ourselves.
For money,
and the pleasures
money can buy.
Profit at any price
eventually runs down,
plays out,
stops working.

06/23/2017 — Nothing is wrong with me
that better advice and guidance
wouldn’t have prevented.
My advisors and guides
would have said the same thing.
How come Obi wan’s and Yodas
are in such short supply?
Where are those who know
hiding out?

Everything happens for a reason:
Because something else happened,
or failed to happen.
There is no starting point
and no end point.
There is only one thing leading to another
for as far as the eye can see.
We all are where we are
because of how we responded
to the people, places and things
that nudged us off our track
and onto another
all along the way.
The trick is that the entire web
of influence and impact–
reaction-action-reaction–
turns on how we respond to it.
How we deal with what happens
effects what happens next.
Everything is related to everything else.
We do not live in a vacuum–
and cannot live as though we do.
Everything we do matters
in terms of the waves of influence
it creates–
the furrows of karma it plows–
for our personal future
and the future of all things.
Every moment is a swing moment.
Every now is the fulcrum shifting
all those that follow.
The present is the turning point
for the rest of time.
Nothing is isolated and/or irrelevant.
Everything is a player
in the field of time and action.
We all have a place
and carry weight.
It only takes realization
to know that it is so.
Then, all that remains,
is living as though it is so–
by being mindfully
(compassionately/non-judgmentally)
aware of what is happening
and what needs to happen
regardless of what we want to happen,
putting ourselves in accord
with the just-so-ness–
with the way-it-is-ness–
of the way things are,
and doing what seems best to us
in light of the true good of the whole.

06/24/2017 — Here is how we all can marry each other
and live happily ever after:
You make a list of all the things
you find attractive
that you imagine about me,
and I will make a list of all the things
I find attractive
that I imagine about you–
and like this all around the circle–
then you spend the rest of your life
working to bring forth in yourself
the things on your list,
and I spend the rest of my life
working to bring forth in myself
the things on my list,
with you working to incarnate me in your life,
and me working to incarnate you in my life.
I become you as only I can be you,
and you become me as only you can be me.
In this way, the two of us become one.
And we don’t have to deal with the in-laws.
It is the perfect union.

06/24/2017 — With focus on the way–
on the path that is The Path–
being paramount,
distractions and diversions are everywhere.
Everything is distraction!
Everything is diversion!
So, let it be
because it is.
Hold everything in your awareness,
and return to your breathing.
Grounded in your breath,
standing/seated/lying/walking/running/driving/etc.
in the present moment
remember the way
and the path that is The Path.
Repeat as often as necessary,
and be well.

06/24/2017 — Of course, everything is one.
We belong,
along with everyone
and everything else
to the great web of life and being
(and non-being).
Without sunlight, where would we be?
Sunlight presupposes sun,
sun presupposes the basic elements
of the universe–
the same elements that comprise the atoms
that make up everything
from crying babes in arms
to grand pianos
and baseball bats
that hit grand slams.
Nothing exists that is not a part
of the whole.
We all are one whole smooch
on the cheek of the source of life and being
(and non-being)–
as Thank-you and celebration!

Of course, we are two.
We are as different as daylight and dark.
Two-ness is no more of an illusion
than one-ness is.
Everybody can see that,
while we are one,
“we are not the same one”
(Johnny Cash and 10,000 others).
Just as daylight and dark
are different aspects
of the same day,
so you and I
are different aspects
of the same species–
we are even different aspects
of ourselves over time.
All trees are the same
and no two trees are alike.
A rock is not an egg.
We can break an egg
and eat its contents,
but if we break a rock
we still have a rock–
and rock dust
(commonly called “sand”)
is still not an egg.
We all have fingerprints,
but none of us have the same fingerprints.
Oneness is not uniformity.
It is in our distinguishing features
that we become the wonder we are.
Our gifts display our uniqueness,
reveal our identity,
set us apart–
yet, not too far apart,
but far enough apart
to recognize the beauty
of the other,
delight in the variety
of the whole,
and appreciate the magic
we all bring to life in the world.

06/25/2017 — When the leader
is incapable of leading,
and “the center
fails to hold”
(W.B. Yeats),
the people have to find
the ground under
their own feet,
and return to the source
of their own identity.
What is good?
Whose good is served
by the good we call good?
What was the face
that was ours
before we were born–
before we were taken
from ourselves
by a culture
needing us
to buy, spend, amass and consume
and keep the culture going?
Failed by the culture,
we have to find our way back
to the bedrock of our being,
and live out of who we are
and what is ours to do.
Led by our intuitive sense,
our instinctive knowledge,
of what is “us” and “not us,”
and good for all of those
seeking to serve
the core of life and being,
we often walk two paths
at the same time,
along a slippery slope,
a dangerous path,
like the razor’s edge,
until we “arrive where we started,
and know it for the first time”
(T.S. Eliot).

Aging is the art
of letting go what’s going
and letting come what’s coming.
It’s all going.
Even what’s coming.
The art of aging
is squaring yourself up
with how it is now.
Forget how much you liked how it was.
Forget how much you don’t like how it is.
Remember, it’s going, too.
So, what the hell?
Mindfulness is the art
of knowing what’s happening now
and responding to it
in ways appropriate
to the occasion.
The art of aging well
hinges on managing
the art of mindfulness well.
When your mind goes
it’s all gone,
but until then,
your mind is your best friend,
and how you live in relation to it
determines everything.
It’s all mental!
Not in terms of logic and reason,
but in terms of awareness and knowing.
Mental is not thinking.
Mental is seeing, hearing, understanding
and living as though we do.
Our mind is how we put
it all together,
heart, soul, instinct, intuition,
logic, reasoning, intellect,
perceiving, assuming, inferring…
Mind is the sphere of perspective and perception,
receiving and responding.
Mind takes the whole show into account,
works out the ratios,
and comes up with a plan of action,
which may be doing nothing at all
but waiting.
There is so much we just have to wait out.
And then,
there is letting go,
and letting come.
Not much action there, either.
Doing nothing at the right time,
in the right spirit,
in the right frame of mind,
is always the best thing to do.

All of the superheros have powers
they they apply as needed
to any situation
everywhere
no matter what.
Mindful awareness
is a superpower
that doesn’t work
that way.
Mindful awareness
positions us
to offer what we have to give
to every situation
as it arises,
but a lot of situations
have no need
of what we have to offer,
and most situations
take no notice.
Mindful awareness
is swept away
in situations
controlled by
mindless ruthlessness,
or simply by
mindless arrogance,
or mindless greed,
or mindless stupidity.
Mindful awareness
positions us to see doors
where we would otherwise
see no doors,
but, the prevailing winds
may not favor
propitious outcomes.
The ability to rise
to every occasion
does not guarantee
successful results.
There is no immunity.
There are no exemptions or exclusions.
Mindful awareness
gives us our best chance
of seeing what is happening
and what needs to happen in response
and doing the same thing
with what happens after that,

But.
It’s nip and tuck all the way.

06/27/2017 — The work of resistance
is the work of mindful awareness,
the ground of which
is the formation
of an individual perspective
which creates individual perceptions,
which is to say individual points of view.
Oneness with ourselves
is primary oneness,
and is the necessary component
in “To Thine Own Self Be True.”
And where shall we incarnate
our truthfulness to our own self–
if not in the field
of the Social,
the Cultural,
and the Political?
We bring ourselves to life in our life
by living in ways that are true to ourselves–
to our individual perspective,
our individual perceptions,
our individual points of view.
No Group Think Allowed.
Republicans who march
in lockstep cadence
to the tune of their Keepers
who bought them their office
cannot tolerate
or dominate
individuals who are
listening to themselves.
Such individuals
are the hope of democracy,
and of the world.

Squaring ourselves up with
what needs to happen.
in light of everything else
that needs to happen,
and holding it all
in our awareness
while we negotiate our way
through the contradictions
and implications
to clarity
and decision
regarding the best
of available,
if only provisional,
alternatives
is the work of being alive.
Forget having a trouble-free existence
with everything going your way
and nothing but peace and contentment
to contemplate,
and joys and delights
to look forward to!
We compromise,
reconcile,
and struggle to find
a way of satisfying
mutually exclusive demands
throughout our life.
If you don’t know
what I’m talking about
you are oblivious
to the realities of your own existence,
and in denial about matters
of grave magnitude.
What passes for “getting by”
is actually “setting ourselves up”
for the “wake-up call”
we hope not to answer.

06/28/2017 — Trump has no foundation,
no direction,
no vision,
no core,
no identity,
no self,
no soul.
He is all show.
All pose.
All posturing.
All impression.
All “Look at me! Look at me! Look at me!”
All “How do you like me now? And now? And now?”
All “Tell me I’m great again! And again! and again!”
He shifts like the wind
toward what he thinks
will make him look good now, and now, and now…
And, like the wind,
there is nothing there.

06/28/2017 — There aren’t many long,
rewarding, pauses
on the path of incarnating
our deepest self
and living the life
that is our joint life to live.
There is one Cyclops encounter
after another–
a string of challenges,
trials and ordeals–
with very little time to relax
and enjoy the view.
Our life,
even when we are living
in sync and aligned
with the highest values,
is a lot like those action/adventure films,
with crises, monsters, disasters, calamities, plights and predicaments
(though much more routne, monotonous, mundane and boring)
coming up all of the time,
one after another,
requiring us to get up
and do what must be done again.
We want to save the world
and we get to change another diaper
(or it’s equivalent).
What we get out of it:
We get to live our life
the way it needs us to live it
in incarnating who we are
in each situation as it arises
all our life long.
Our life is the canvas.
We are the artist
and the image.
How we do it
is IT.

06/28/2017— The church was before the Bible–
by about 300 years.
The church created the Bible,
and then said,
“Look what God gave us!
The Verbally Inspired Word
of the Living God!
You better believe it
as written,
or you will go straight to Hell!”
Now, that’s leverage, Folks–
which the church used
to it’s advantage,
with heresy trials,
persecutions,
and burnings at the stake,
removing its competition,
and strengthening its position
as the Dispenser of the Sacraments
and the Only Way to Heaven.
Clever,
verrrrry clever.

06/28/2017 — The more Republicans repeat the lie,
any lie,
every lie,
all lies,
the more palatable they become,
the more acceptable they are,
until they become
replacement truth
in the minds of those
hypnotized by the repetition.
It takes conscious resistance–
calling each lie the lie that it is
with unrelenting devotion
to the task.
They are lying.
They are liars.
Do not make excuses for them.
Do not gloss over their lies,
their lying.
Do not let it become okay.
Do not let it go unnoticed,
undenounced.
Not even once.

06/28/2017 — Trump has changed–
and is changing–everything.
We have to be sure
that one of the things
most certainly and completely changes
is ourselves.
We have to change
in response to the changes
Trump is hurling at us.
We have to become informed.
Subscribe to the NY Times
and the Washington Post–
and read them!
We have to pay attention intently,
intensely,
deliberately–
to words and how they are used:
terrorism,
extremism,
safety,
protection,
patriotism,
liberty–
and we have to stop using words
mindlessly,
words that we pick up from TV
or opinion-ball at the office
or wherever people gather.
Words cannot be fire-starters.
They have to have referents,
meaning,
boundaries,
limits.
We have to know what we are saying,
what is being said,
without being inflamed and enraged
by catch-phrases
and trigger-mechanisms.
We have to call lies out.
We have to refuse to accept anything
as “the new normal.”
We have to know who we are
and what values and principles
constitute our bedrock.
We have to live grounded
in our own identity–
in our own sense of right and wrong,
good and bad,
sick and evil.
And we have to be stirred to action
in response to all that is wrong
in our country and its politics.
Change for the worse
has to stir us
to change for the better.

06/29/2017 — A Walk In The Woods — Indian Land, South Carolina, November 15, 2016

We all have to choose
where we stand.
I choose to stand
with Jesus and the Buddha,
the Dalai Lama and Gandhi,
Martin Luther King, Jr
and Rosa Parks–
not because they are who they are,
but because of where they stand:
With the gays and the women,
the blacks and the Latinos,
the poor and the disabled,
the old and the lame,
the young and the vulnerable,
the Muslims and the victims
of violence and hatred,
and all who are marginalized,
stigmatized,
disenfranchised,
despised
and ignored.
We all have to stand somewhere–
and do what we can
to help those
who need our help
the most.
Why stand with those
who don’t need our help
at all?

02/29/2017 — Know where you stand,
decide where you stand,
choose where you stand,
and stand there.
When you change your mind
about where you stand,
stand there.
And stand there
because that’s where YOU stand,
and not because
that’s where somebody else stands
or where somebody tells you to stand.
Even if Jesus stands there,
don’t stand there because Jesus does.
Stand there because YOU do.
Even if your Mamma tells you to stand there,
or your Daddy,
don’t stand there unless it is where you belong.
Nobody knows where you belong
better than you.
You have to know what you know.
Know what is right for you.
Know where you belong.
Know where you stand.
Be true to yourself
and stand there–
all by yourself if need be.
If no one stands with you, fine.
If Jesus,
and your Mamma,
and your Daddy
stand with you, fine.
By you stand where you stand
until you change your mind,
and then stand there.
And if you don’t know where you stand,
stand there.
And if you can’t decide where you stand,
stand there.
Until you change your mind.

06/29/2017 — Throughout my career as a minister
in the Presbyterian Church U.S.A.,
I dealt with entirely too many parishioners
who thought Christianity was about believing
certain things,
which had very little to do
with how they lived their lives.
Christians live like everyone else,
and argue over what is to be believed.
What shall we believe?
Is answered by knowing
what we shall do–
then we believe whatever it takes
to do what needs us to do it.
But, people do not want
to think about how to live their life.
They want to live any way that suits them
and go to heaven when they die.
They do not understand
that heaven and hell
are what we make of things
while we are alive
by the nature and quality
of the life we are living.
How we live
makes it as good as it can be
or as bad as it can get.
It is up to us.
Members of Alcoholics Anonymous
and other 12-Step programs
are the only people I have met
who understand
that it is up to us.
Everyone else wants to believe
there is something magical
about believing the right beliefs,
or reading the right books,
or praying the right way,
that will spin things into
what we want them to be.
When there is only getting up each day
and doing that day
what needs to be done
with what meets us on the path–
the way it needs to be done,
and to repeat the process
through all the coming tomorrows.
How we live our life
each day of our life
creates the karma,
the momentum,
that turns things toward heaven
or toward hell.
Believe whatever it takes
to live as a source of blessing
and grace
in the life of everyone
who comes our way.
That is all the world needs,
and everyone is capable of doing it.

06/29/2017 — We do not want
to get up each day
and go meet whatever
comes to meet us on the path.
We do not want to live our life
the way it needs us to live it.
We want smooth and easy and FUN!
We want the good times to roll on and on.
And when they don’t,
we want to stay drunk or high,
or drunk and high,
until they do.
Or we escape into some other
form of entertainment/addiction.
That list is very long.
If we cannot have what we want,
we will sulk and pout,
snarl and growl,
buck and snort
until death carries us away.
No one can make us grow up!
That is an inside job.
One that requires us to put
ourselves in accord with what
has need of us–
and do what is asked of us–
no matter how rough,
difficult,
and not a bit FUN
it is.
Why do some people do that,
while some never do?
That’s the separator
that parts the crowd
in every generation.

The Buddhists say,
“If you meet the Buddha on the road,
kill him!”
The Christians ought to be saying
the same thing about Jesus.
Don’t let Jesus keep you
from knowing what you know,
from thinking what you think,
from standing where you stand,
from being where you belong,
from doing what is yours to do,
from being who you are,
from living spontaneously
and automatically,
straight from your heart,
without bothering to wonder,
“What would Jesus do?”
Do what YOU would do!
Jesus said,
“Why don’t you judge for yourselves what is right?”
(Look it up!)
Answer the question!
With the way you live your life!
Live your life
in ways that declare:
“This is right because I–I!–say so!”

06/30/2017— The spiritual journey
and the hero’s journey
are the same journey,
and they aren’t about
getting somewhere.
We aren’t going anywhere.
We are waking up,
and being here,
exactly where we are,
for the first time,
with our eyes open.
The “journey” is the distance
from our head to our heart.
It is the realization
that our “mind”
is the perspective/perception center
of our being.
“Mind” holds everything in awareness
at all times–
past, present, and perhaps even, future–
in a timeless “now” of knowing.
As conscious egos,
we move in and out of that,
as we are able to receive it,
and it comes to us as an epiphany,
a visitation of the gods.
We are capable of a larger view,
a grander vision,
than we generally have time for,
thus the disciplines
for stilling and quieting
our interaction with “the dust of the world.”
All of which we can undertake
in the comfort of our recliner.
opening “the doorways of perception”
without ever leaving home.

Our practice–
whether we think of it as The Way,
the Tao,
God’s will for our life,
creating good karma,
being grounded in the bedrock
of our own identity and values,
or any other formulation
that is “it” for us–
comes down to
doing the ordinary things
the way they need to be done,
spontaneously,
from the heart,
without thinking anything of it.
We “eat when hungry,
rest when tired,”
and go about the business of the day,
in ways that are suited
to incarnating our gifts
and assisting what needs our help
each day.
We rock the world
by being a steady source
of goodness and vitality
and letting that be that.

07/01/2017 — Life can be very difficult–
and we make it harder
by expecting more of it
than it has to offer.
If we can serve our gifts
and pay the bills
in a spirit of grace and kindness,
compassion and good will,
that is as much
as we have any right
to hope or wish for.

07/01/2017 — Kellyanne Conway,
and most Republicans along with her,
believe that anybody
who really wants a job
can get one
and earn enough
to pay her or his way.
Not only that,
but she (and they) also believe
that to not have a job and earn your way
is to be a “freeloader,”
a “slacker and a lay-a-bout,”
and to deserve the poverty
that is the natural result of–
in their mind–
“refusing to work.”
This is a problem.
Donald Trump,
and a host of Republicans along with him,
believes that he got where he is–
a billionaire and President of the United States of America–
by the strength of his own brilliance and effort.
He’s earned it and he deserves it
(And those other Republicans feel
the same way about their successful lives).
This is another problem.
As they see it,
poor people deserve being poor,
and rich people deserve being rich.
Thinking that way makes them Republican.
If they thought differently,
they would be Democrat.
Democrats think if they
can be reasonable and logical
and throw enough facts at Republicans,
they can make Democrats of them.
This is a problem.
If you can solve these three problems,
you can transform the world.

The foundation of all good religion,
world-wide
(Universal, should there prove
to be religions in other parts
of the universe)
is expressed in the four primary symbols
of Christianity–
devoid of the theology surrounding them:
Bread, Wine, Water, Cross.
The Water is the amniotic fluid of birth.
Every birth is birth by “water (and blood) and spirit,”
with the “spirit” being the spirit of life and being.
We are all united by the water of birth
and the spirit of life.
We are all alive,
but we have no idea what that means,
where life comes from
and where it goes.
We are awash in mystery from the first.
The Bread reminds us that the bread of affliction
is the bread of life.
The Wine declares that the cup of suffering
is the cup of salvation.
And the Cross does not represent
a vehicle of execution,
but the burden of growing up
and bearing the opposites,
the contradictions
and polarities of our life–
and encompasses all of the initiation rites,
and rites of passage,
of the species,
as well as evidencing
the primary place
trials and ordeals
hold in the life of all people,
serving everyone as the
impetus for growth and maturity,
and enabling us to discover
the hero who resides unknown within us.
These symbols unite us all.
Everyone knows out of
our own experience
the validity of each one
and their place in our life.
They are the ground on which we stand,
the source from which we proceed
to form,
shape,
and define the life we are living.
And we need no theology
to tell us something we already know
by having lived it.

07/01/2017 — My work is looking
until I see something
of how things are,
and then saying
what I see,
then looking some more.
This is the work of Hermes
(Mercury)
“the messenger of the gods.”
It is the work of hermeneutics,
the work of interpretation.
It is good work,
interesting work,
enthralling work,
and I am glad to have it
as my work.
I am glad to know what it is,
and what all it is not.
You can spin yourself
in circles not knowing
what your work is,
or wishing your work was something
it isn’t.
There is no greater personal good
than knowing what your work is
and doing it–
and not allowing anyone
or anything
to take your work away
from you
or shame, ridicule, mock or laugh
you out of doing it.
And asking you
what good it is doing
is their favorite way
of taking away your work.
It doesn’t have to DO any good.
It IS good.
If they don’t understand that
they have no idea
of the work that is theirs to do–
and that is theirs
to work out for themselves.

07/01/2017 — There is something about
being at the mercy
of our circumstances
that brings out the best
and the worst in us.
Sometimes we rise to meet
every occasion,
and sometimes we cave
at the mere idea of catastrophe.
And, through it all,
the truth remains:
We are at the mercy
of our circumstances–
and making our peace
with that may well be
our greatest work.

07/01/2017 — Victor Frankl, in “Man’s Search for Meaning,”
writes about his experience
in a German death camp during World War II.
He and his fellow prisoners
lived every day
not knowing if they
would see tomorrow.
Everyday might be their turn
to be loaded in the trucks
and taken out to be shot.
The stress of the possibility
was too much for many,
and they died at the idea
of their death–
though they remained 98.6 and breathing,
no one lived behind
their unseeing eyes.
Theirs were merciless circumstances,
severely testing the spirits
of all behind the barbed wire.
But some did not surrender their spirit.
Some let their present be their present,
and did what they could
to relieve the plight of their fellows,
sharing a crumb of bread,
a sip of water–
practicing their humanity
in the worst that inhumanity could do,
in a “We may be dying,
but we aren’t dead yet,”
kind of way–
living as a ray of hope
in a land where hope was not,
except for them
and the kindness they exhibited
for no reason beyond the joy
of being kind for no reason.
An experience their captors
never had.

07/02/2017 — Do not hinder the spirit
that is like the wind,
blowing where it will!
You can call it “Holy Spirit,”
or you can call it “our spirit,”
or you can call it “the spirit of life,”
or you can call it “the Great Spirit”
…
It doesn’t matter what you call the spirit
that is like the wind,
blowing where it will.
Do. Not. Hinder. The. Spirit.
Serve it.
Assist it.
Tag along with it.
It will carry you to amazing wonders
and adventures beyond imagining.
It is never too late
to catch the Spirit Train
for the ride of your life!
Sit quietly,
and say, “Okay. Let’s go.”
The catch is
you have to mean it.

07/03/2017 — A Walk in the Woods 2016 23 Panorama — Indian Land, South Carolina, November 13, 2016

The turning points in our life
are places we have shown ourselves
who we are
and what is important to us.
We are brought forth
by our circumstances.
Without the crossroads,
our life would be a straight line–
in the heart beat sense of the term–
and we would be at the end
as we were at the beginning,
like so many people are
who live to avoid the crossroads,
ignoring their options,
pretending they have no choices,
refusing to think anything
they have not already thought,
or have aspirations
their family wouldn’t like.
Being safe that way
is as good as dead.
There are 10,000 ways
to refuse to grow up.
They all involve
shunning crossroads
in one way or another.

07/03/2017 — The Garden of Eden
is a wonderful metaphor
for the human condition.
We can find something wrong
with Paradise!
We can imagine improvements
even there!
There is nothing we cannot
endlessly tweak
in the quest for perfection.
A magic wand would be
a matrix of madness
with us forever locked into
trying to get things right!
Politics is the next best thing
for messing with our innate
capacity for messing with things.
The Buddhist remedy
is the final solution:
Sit quietly!
Be still!

07/03/2017 — We have to know what we love,
and be clear about it,
and do what we love.
What keeps that from happening?
Be clear about it.
Is there any way
you can smuggle what you love
into your life?
If so, do it!
If not, imagine doing what you love.
Imagine it regularly.
With clarity.
Doing what you love
is the path for incarnating you
in the world,
in the field of action.
If you can only imagine that,
then rehearse incarnating you
in your mind.
And, when the door opens
for bringing you forth into the world,
step through!

07/03/2017 — We cannot help anyone
be grounded
if we are not grounded.
We vitalize
by being vitalized–
by believing
in what we are doing.
By working what we love
into the life we are living.
By being transparent
to ourselves.
By knowing what’s what
and how things are,
and squaring ourselves
up with that
in a way that enables us
to go forth and meet the day
every day
with “true grit,”
and good faith.
Who we are
counts more than
what we say.
Integrity–
in the sense of living
aligned with our heart’s
true bent–
is enlivening.

All of our quandaries are conflicts of values.
Are we better off here or there?
Is it better to stand firm or stand aside?
Is it better to die here or live to fight another day?
What is the good that is truly good
in every situation,
in all circumstances?
The answer is very situational
and circumstantial.
Which is to say,
there is no answer
except the one worked out
in the time and place of our living
by wringing our hands,
crying on our pillow,
and being in a quandary.
Only we can balance the competing
claims upon us.
Only we can decide what compromise
is called for,
what trade-off is required,
what concessions are required.
In order to have this,
we have to give up that.
In order to avoid that,
we have to embrace this.
Divorce is sometimes the answer,
and sometimes not the answer.
And so it is with all of our answers
to the what to do here and now questions
that pop up all of the time
and invite us again
to partake of the trials and ordeals
of being human.

07/04/2017 — It is unthinkable
what the Republicans are thinking
of doing–
what the Republicans are planning
to do.
People mean nothing to Republicans.
23 million without insurance–
without access to health care–
are nothing to them.
I cannot imagine a course of appeal
that would have an impact.
They do not care.
And caring is the fundamental requirement
of life as a human being.
Squid do not care.
Starfish do not care.
A lion on the hung does not care.
Number Republicans among their lot.
Heartless men and women on the hunt.
In the hunt for a tax-cut of $765 billion.
$765 billion will buy a lot of hearts.
However you spin it,
it amounts to 30 pieces of silver–
and a life without heart or soul
for those who vote for it.
They will never be able to un-do
what they are about to do.

I have a theory:
All of us have an aspect–
or aspects–
of our life that
isn’t working.
No one’s life is working
on all levels
at the same time.
It may be physical,
or financial,
or familial,
or social,
or emotional/psychological,
or religious,
or sexual,
or, well, the list of possibilities
is endless,
with combinations
that can produce
some interesting
behavioral outcomes.
And here’s my point:
How we compensate
for the area(s) that aren’t working
makes all the difference.
We had better be consciously,
mindfully,
compassionately,
acceptably,
aware
of what isn’t working
and of what we are doing
in response.
It is easy to make things worse
trying to make them better.
It is best to hold all things in awareness,
seeing what the antecedents
and implications are,
what the impact has been,
and what options exist
for dealing with the situation–
with growing up
some more
again
being one of my all time faves.

07/05/2017 — People need help with their life,
but what they are interested in
and open to
has nothing to do
with finding–
or receiving–
what they need.
You see the problem.
We could call this
The Trump Problem.
Put Trump in a room
with Help With His Life,
and he will leave the room.
You cannot give people
what they do not want.
Logic,
reason,
and lectures
will not work.
Crying,
yelling,
and turning over furniture
will not work.
Prayer,
medication
and jail time
will not work.
Walking off,
moving away,
and leaving them
to their own outcomes
will not work either,
but it will restore your balance,
lower your blood pressure,
and improve your digestion.

07/05/2017 — See what you can do with it
is my best advice.
With your circumstances.
With your life.
With your options and choices.
Even now.
Even yet.
Give it all–
give yourself–
the benefit of the doubt.
Trust it all–
trust yourself–
to be more than meets the eye;
to hold possibilities
and potentials
you have yet to consider,
and give your circumstances,
your life,
you
a chance to surprise you
with what might yet happen,
even now.
Start with sitting quietly
and observing everything
that swirls up for review
in the silence–
without becoming
emotionally stirred by
and involved with
any of it.
Or, when you find yourself
becoming so stirred
and involved,
simply hold that in awareness
along with all the rest,
and continue to observe
the things that come into
consciousness–
not doing anything
about any of it.
Just seeing.
Just observing.
Just noting what’s there.
When you have had enough,
get up and do whatever is next,
but return to sitting quietly,
observing your thoughts
and the patterns they form–
without opinion,
judgment
or conclusion.
Continue this practice
over time.
See what all occurs to you,
what spontaneously arises,
presenting itself for reflection,
realization.
And what that is inviting
you to do.
It isn’t as cut and dried,
over and done,
as we like to think.
See what might yet be done,
even now.

07/05/2017 — George Lakoff says that Republicans
and Democrats
have different brains.
Different values.
Different views of what is good
and what is evil.
Republicans, for the most part,
will be quick to tell you
that Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton
are Evil Personified,
and that Nothing–
not even Donald Trump–
could be worse than they are.
Democrats would have a different take
on the matter,
reversing names and places.
You will never convince either
that the other is right.
Where do we go from here?
It would be great for all concerned
if Republicans could have their President
and Democrats could have theirs–
if Republicans could have their country,
and Democrats could have theirs.
Barring that,
we are going to have to work things out
among ourselves–
an option that becomes less likely
by the day.
To “move toward the center”
is to realize that what one side
considers extreme,
the other side considers central.
Is abortion a woman’s
personal business
or a matter to be decided
by majority vote?
Are gay rights restricted
by religious persuasion?
Can bigotry, racism and discrimination
be allowed to operate freely
in a society governed
by justice and truth?
Does money get to determine
what is good and right?
Who says so?
How is agreement to be reached
and enforced?
Sending everyone into Time Out
until they reach a state
of calmness and civility
would be almost as good
as giving each side
its own country.
And about as workable.
Leaving us where we were
when this started,
wondering where do we go
from here.

07/05/2017 — Republicans refuse to say what they are doing:
Trading health coverage for 22 Million people
for a tax refund of $765 Billion (+/-)
for those making over $200,000 a year.
They think we don’t know.

This is an excerpt from “God” in my book “An Old Preacher’s Manifesto”:

With God, all dichotomies are false dichotomies,
all categories are inclusive categories–
convenient and inaccurate concessions
to the sphere of space and time.
God is he-she-we-they,
and is completely free to do what needs to be done
in each situation as it arises,
in the moment as it unfolds before him-her-we-them
Without reference to anything that may have happened before,
or concern for anything that may happen afterward, in response,
as an outcome, as a consequence,
however many generations removed from the event in question.
There is no figuring out a God like God—
no calculating the percentages,
computing the odds,
and coming up with what to do to best protect ourselves,
and insure a rosy future
filled with what we like
And devoid of what we don’t like.
Not even God knows what to expect from God–
beyond being appropriate to the time and place
of his-her-our-their acting.
God dwells in deep darkness—
God arises from the depths of unconsciousness—
to astound and amaze,
confound and befuddle,
disturb and dumbfound,
even God.
God stuns God with God’s brilliance and lunacy,
and unprecedented unpredictability.

07/06/2017 — Republicans are kidding themselves,
shrouding themselves in denial,
refusing to face up to
the full implications and impact
of what they are doing
and failing to live transparent
to themselves.
Their current favorite line
is to say,
“No one will lose health care
under our new plan.
They may choose not to take it,
but no one will snatch it away.
Freedom of choice is what
we are all want.
It is the American Way!”
This is a trick with terminology
that they are playing on themselves.
Everyone else sees through
the charade.
Mike Pence is a devout Evangelical Christian
and is unshakably certain
that we are in the last days,
with the Rapture being imminent,
when those who are destined for heaven
will be swept up in an instant
and those who remain
will deserve the punishment
that is theirs to bear–
so it doesn’t really matter
what the government does.
Give the wealthy deserving ones
a nice tax-break
as a prelude of the glories to come,
and party until Jesus returns.
Truth is always apparent
to those with eyes to see.
And everyone thinks
their eyes see truth best.
That is the kink in the hose.

Symptoms can be caused by facts
over which we have no control.
We do not give ourselves peanut allergies.
Or malaria.
Or 10,000 other things.
Yet, all of our symptoms are warning us
to listen to our symptoms
and take action
to get the pathogen/toxin
out of our life.
They are all saying,
“Something is wrong here!”
This is where we come in.
We can tell ourselves things
about our symptoms
that keep our symptoms
in place.
“Maybe it will go away.”
“Maybe it isn’t what I think it is.”
“Maybe the doctor is wrong.”
And keep doing the things
that keep our symptoms in place.
How many of our symptoms
are there
because we refuse to do
what is necessary
to remove them?
Because we do not want to believe
what they are saying?
Because they are enemies
of the life we want to live?
We refuse to listen to our symptoms
and wonder what is wrong.
But we don’t want to know
what is wrong.
It would ask too much of us.
It would require us
to change the way we live.
And that would be the end
of life as we know it.
Life as we know it
is killing us,
but changing would be like death
as well.
This is where good religion
could be a real help,
with it’s central message:
“There is no life without death!
In order to live,
we have to die–
again and again–
in the service of LIFE!”
We have to be sure we are dying
the right kind of death,
and do the thing that “kills” us
in order to live the life
that is calling us to live it.

07/07/2017 — We are left with
protesting, objecting, resisting,
opposing, denouncing, rejecting,
demanding, insisting, declaring,
challenging, dissenting, exposing,
condemning, criticizing, reviling,
decrying, bemoaning, castigating,
lambasting, chastising, berating
and making known the truth
of the wrongs
that are being done
by the People Of The Lie
every time they
do what they do.
Every.
Time.

07/07/2017 — I would love to know
what gives Donald Trump
his direction,
where he derives his sense
of right and wrong,
good and evil,
yes and no.
Why would anyone refuse
to recognize and support
Gay Pride Month?
Or reject the opportunity
to visit a Holocaust Memorial?
Or ridicule the physically disabled?
Or slam/shame people
for being Muslims?
Or belittle people for being poor?
Or encourage violence, bullying,
and the complete disregard
for civil/human rights?
What is good about
any of the things Donald Trump
calls good?

07/07/2017 — I would never meet the requirements
for admission to the Sacred Order of Shamans.
Or to the Venerable Ranks of Taoist Priests.
Or, even to the Raucous Company of Zen Monks.
I don’t have the proper attitude and deportment;
am too much the Iconoclast,
the Joker,
the Renegade,
the Reprobate,
the Unwashed and Unrepentant.
And I don’t care enough
that I don’t have what it takes
to belong to the above mentioned associations
to do what it takes to fit in.
If I wanted to join them badly enough,
I might try to make the effort.
But then,
I’m sure the truth would will out,
and I would be out,
in practically no time at all.

Letting things be as they are–
because they are what they are–
even as we protest what they are,
and work to change what they are,
is the ground of mental health
and responsible response
to our environment
in a :
“This is the way things are,
and this is the way they should be,
and this is what I am doing
to make things more like they should be
than they are”
kind of way.
Don’t spend your life
bummed out by the way things are!
Live “under protest”!
Live in solid opposition–
in solidarity with the resistance!
Live at one with all of those
who know things could be better
than they are,
keeping the coals of opposition alive
so that the faint light
informs everyone who comes our way
of the truth
of what needs to be done
to transform the way things are done
into the way things
ought to be done.
Live symbolically in the way
of the Ought To Be!
Know the truth of the Ought To Be
that it might keep you
from succumbing
to the truth of How Things Are!
Resist! Oppose! Denounce! Decry!
“Acceptance” means
accepting that this is the way things are
and this is what needs to be done about it
and doing it
for as long as it takes
to generate the momentum
that results in the shift
that produces the transformation.
Do not submit!
Resist!

07/08/2017 — Think of all the people you know
in nursing homes.
Think of how many of those people
receive Medicaid assistance
each month.
Think of what will become of those people
when the Republicans end Medicaid
(to pay for a $765 billion tax-cut to the wealthy).
Think of what will become of the nursing homes.
Think of what will become of the people
who work in the nursing homes.
Who work manufacturing beds for nursing homes.
Etc. throughout the nursing home/health care niche.
Write your senator(s).
Call your senator(s).
Daily.
Jam the phone lines.
Do not rest
and give them no rest
until they come to their senses
and do the things that need to be done
and do not do the things that do not need to be done–
and maintain the vigil
of helping them know which is which.

07/08/2017 — Health and Human Services Secretary,
Thomas Price, MD, said,
“No one will lose Medicaid benefits”
under the Senate’s health plan.
Sounds good.
Sounds reassuring.
Sounds as though there is nothing to worry about.
Until you realize
that he is speaking Republican.
What he doesn’t say is that
“A lot of people will choose
to not pay for the benefits
they aren’t losing
but won’t have
if they do not pay for them.”
You cannot trust Republicans
to tell you the Whole Truth.
They speak in partial truths,
which is another form of lying.
When Republicans speak,
they are lying.
Adopt that as a rule of thumb,
and you will not be often wrong.

07/08/2017 — Listening within,
being aware of our own
pushes and pulls,
drift and flow,
leanings and interests,
sets the tone
for the life we live,
and enables us
to assume responsibility
for the times and places
when and where
we choose to override ourselves
or choose to assert ourselves.
Those are the places
we want to be careful
to live through mindfully,
knowingly,
responsibly.

07/08/2017 — Consciousness-that-is-also-mindfulness,
is the human gift to the cosmos,
in that it implies self-transparency,
compassion
and a non-judgmental,
non-opinionated,
orientation toward
the time and place,
the conditions and circumstances,
of our life.
This does not mean
we are without preferences.
It means we take everything into account,
and determine
on the basis of knowing all that we know
what action is in the best interest
of all concerned.
It means we live as non-partisans in the world.
We need all members of congress
to be conscious and mindful.
That would not be asking too much.

07/08/2017— Who is Trump trying to please?
Bannon and the white supremacists?
The racists and the climate change deniers?
Homophobes and Xenophobes?
Who is the audience
he thinks he is appeasing?
How can a minority rule?
This is Alice in Far From Wonder Land.

07/09/2017 — A Walk in the Woods 2016 16 — Indian Land, South Carolina, November 15, 2015.

Here we are.
Now what?
Negative forces
detrimental
to the human spirit,
and to the life of the world,
have been let loose,
and there is no undoing
what has been done.
We are left with
resisting,
opposing,
confronting,
countering,
balancing
and off-setting
the manifestation of evil
in all forms
at every opportunity.
We cannot be slack
in our vigilance
and in our response–
exhibiting kindness
and compassion
but firmly refusing
to allow incivility,
racism,
sexism,
homophobia,
bigotry,
discrimination,
cruelty
and viciousness
to go unchecked.
We will not assist
the work to dismantle
the values of democracy:
Justice,
Equality,
Liberty
and Truth
by refusing/failing
to oppose it–
for as long as it takes
the tide to turn.

07/09/2017 — If we take Paul’s directive in Philippians:
“Whatever is honorable, whatever is just, whatever is pure, whatever is lovely, whatever is commendable, if there is any excellence, if there is anything worthy of praise, think about these things”
and apply it to Donald Trump,
his cabinet and advisors,
and the Republicans in the House and Senate,
we won’t have much
to think about.

07/09/2017 — Choosing between unworkable options
is no choice.
Taking away Medicade
and offering credits and vouchers
for health care we still can’t afford
does not qualify for a choice.
Choosing between health care
and food/clothing/shelter
is not a choice.
It is a lie
and an obscenity
to contend otherwise.

07/10/2017 — A Walk in the Woods 2016 14 — Indian Land, South Carolina, November 15, 2016

Putin is ruthlessly effective
in his service of his idea of The Good.
We all serve our idea of The Good,
more or less.
Most of us serve our idea of The Pretty Good.
Our idea of The Good Enough.
Few of us serve our idea of The Good
with as much single-minded devotion
and 24/7/12/Forever commitment to the vision
as Putin displays.
Putin kills anyone standing in his way.
Nothing stands in his way for long.
I expect Trump could be as vicious–
he at least admires others who are–
but Trump (and those others he admires)
lack Putin’s love for what money and power can do.
Trump (et al.) think money and power
are enough in themselves,
and simply enjoy the thrill
of being able to order people around.
Putin seems to be serving his idea of Russian Good,
even though that is highly detrimental
to the Russian people in general
and to individual Russians in particular.
What is the Russia Putin has in mind?
Who would want to live there?
Who would Putin want living there?
Workers and servants to keep things going,
to be sure, but.
What would keep the workers and servants going?
I think Putin hasn’t thought this out.
His idea of The Good he serves
is limited to his idea of The People he likes.
To hell with the rest of them.
Strong men and women are always saying
“To hell with the rest of them”
(“Give them bread and circuses,”
“Let them eat cake”).
We need to serve an idea of The Good
that takes everyone’s Good into account,
and serve it with the same zeal
that Putin serves his idea of The Good.
You know, like Jesus and Gandhi (et al.) did.
People like Putin
are always putting people like Jesus and Gandhi (et al.)
in their place.
That’s the advantage of ruthlessness.
The disadvantage of ruthlessness
is that it can only serve an idea of The Good
that isn’t so Good.

07/10/2017 — If we could only
fold ourselves into our life
and live it the way
it needs to be lived,
serving the things
that need to be served,
doing the things
that need to be done–
instead of pursuing
distracting pastimes
and entertaining diversions!
What is central?
What is peripheral?
What is a pointless waste
of our time and energy?
it takes time, silence and reflection
to get to the bottom of things.
Solitude is a great source of clarification.
Muddy water settles while we wait, watching,
looking, attending, seeing, hearing, knowing…
We are in a hurry, though.
Things to do.
Things to achieve.
Things to acquire.
No time to wonder
what matters most,
and what matters not at all.

07/10/2017 — When I look back over my life,
one of the things that stands out
is how everything works together
to enable me to meet the present moment.
At some point,
we collect enough experiences
with enough moments
to be ready for any moment.
I look at that as the turning point–
“the still point of the turning world,”
the fulcrum levering us into all possible futures,
the power point
providing us with the foundation
for facing whatever is next
in the confidence that we have what it takes
to find what it takes
to deal with anything.
If we have done it up to now,
and we all have,
we can do it all the way
from now on.
We are living proof
that we have what it takes.

07/10/2017 — “The task of life,”
says John Kaag,
writing in
American Philosophy: A Love Story,
“is to transcend the past,
to never remain where on starts,
to find a place of one’s own.”
His book is well worth reading
for a number of other reasons,
but this should be enough
to send you out for it,
and to urge you to be intentional
about your search
for a place of your own.

07/10/2017 — Some of us spend our life
learning to live in sync
with ourselves–
coming to be who we are
over the time we have
to work with.
Others of us spend our life
running with horror
from the one within,
refusing to acknowledge
even distant association.
Still others of us
have no idea
of what I am talking about.
We are strung out
like this
along every continuum
you can think of,
or think up.
It’s hard to settle down
with how different we are
considering that we
have so much in common.

07/11/2017 — A Walk in the Woods 2016 30 — Indian Land, South Carolina, November 15, 2016

Our life has a certain
tone, quality, direction about it
apart from what we do
to pay the bills,
which expresses
vitality, heart, soul and spirit–
reflecting the core,
essence,
truth
of how we have responded
to what has happened,
or failed to happen,
to us along the way.
We can live
without believing in our life,
without having
hope, faith or trust in our life.
Without wanting to be alive.
This is called
losing the spark,
having no fire.
We have to tend the flame!
With the right kind of attention,
the flame can burn brightly
in the deepest darkness–
but, we cannot be attentive to the flame
AND attentive to the darkness.
We cannot keep the flame alive
consumed by the fear of the darkness.
Where is our ground?
Our bedrock?
Our truth and identity?
Sink into that!
Live out of that!
Whatever the nature
of our context and circumstances!
Bring YOU to bear
on your life!
On you!
Be YOU–
wherever, whenever, however
you are!
Believe in YOU!
Be one with YOU!
Live to be YOU!
Matter. What.

07/11/2017 — Being does not come
from trying to be.
Being just is.
Jesus did not
try to be Jesus,
did not wonder
“What would Jesus do?”
Jesus just did
what was appropriate
to the occasion–
spontaneously, automatically–
being who he was
in response
to what was needed.
Sitting quietly,
we find our heart,
our center,
our foundation,
our bedrock,
our self.
Rising,
we live out of
the core of who we are.
We are who we are.
What we do is who we are.
That is Being.
Being is being who we are.
Who WE are.
In all times and places,
conditions and circumstances–
in ways appropriate to the occasion.

07/11/2017 — Silence is the best place
I know of for sorting things out.
I sit, or lie, quietly
and begin sifting through
whatever comes to mind,
turning things over
as with a compost pile–
memories, experiences,
fears, dreads, regrets, joys, delights, miseries, sorrows…
I rummage around in all of it,
sometimes making new connections,
conjuring up a realization or two,
mostly reflecting on it all,
keeping it suspended in my awareness
and honoring it with my attention
as a way of declaring,
“Out of you, I am!”
in a “Where would I be without you?”
kind of way.
Touching the substance
of my soul’s treasure-trove
in this way
grounds me in the truth
of what I have been through
and of what has happened,
and failed to happen,
because of it,
and steadies me
for what lies ahead.
I’m here, now,
and I will be there, then.
That’s as much encouragement
as I need
to be able to stand
and step into whatever
needs to be done
in the field of action,
to be added to the larder
supplying the next round
of exploring the silence
and panning for its gold.

07/12/2017 — A Walk in the Woods 2016 22 Panorama — Indian Land, South Carolina, November 15, 2016

“Detached engagement” is the kind
of dialectic/paradox
that forms the ground
of our way in the world.
We “step back”
in order to see
with “disinterested eyes”–
non-judgmental eyes,
unbiased eyes,
dispassionate eyes,
objective eyes,
eyes unconcerned
with what is in it for us
or where our advantage lies–
what is happening
and what needs to be done about it,
in order to “step forward”
into the field of action
and engage the forces
at work there
in light of the true good of all concerned.
Judges and politicians
need to be of this bent,
as do those who elect
politicians who appoint judges.
It all hangs on individual citizens
doing their part
in being who they need to be.
When individual citizens
embrace detachment
in order to escape their life
and deny their role
in finding, forming and shaping
a life worth living,
with no idea of engaging anythng
beyond their own good/advantage/profit/benefit
in the field of action,
the system crumbles
and “there is none who does right,
no, not one.”
Entertaining pastimes–
“Bread and circuses”–
cannot comprise our life!
We have to live seeking and serving
what has life for us,
in the sense of what brings us forth,
utilizes our gifts and our genius,
and enables us to be who we are
in the field of action,
in the midst of all that is
“grave and constant in human joy and suffering”
(James Joyce/Joseph Campbell).
We cannot run from our duty
to life our life as it needs us to live it
in each situation as it arises
all our life long.

07/13/2017 — A Walk in the Woods 2016 25 Panorama — Indian Land, South Carolina, November 15, 2016

We interpret the facts
to suit our fancies.
We shape the truth
to fit our needs.
We bend reality
to conform to our expectations
and desires.
You can’t show us,
tell us,
confront us
with anything
we can’t explain away.
We can disappear everything
just by saying,
“That is false!”
“That is a lie!”
“That is ‘Fake News!'”
“That never happened,
and if it did,
it doesn’t matter!”
Kidding ourselves
is what we do best.
No!
Telling ourselves
what we want to hear
is what we do best!
No!
Pretending we
are not pretending
is what we do best!
No!
Shooting ourselves
in the foot
is what we do best!
And,
in order to stop,
we have to sit quietly
long enough
for insight and realization
to begin to dawn.
And then,
when we have to jump up
and begin making noise
to shut out
the truth of silence,
we have to sit back down,
and look at
what caused the panic reaction,
hearing and seeing
what we have repressed,
suppressed
and denied–
and taking up the work
of self-transparency,
integration
and integrity
for as long
as we have yet to live.

07/13/2017 — Encased in denial,
Republicans are immune
to all truth contrary
to their idea of truth.
Invincible!
Invulnerable!
Indomitable!
Unassailable!
They know they are right–
they have never been righter.
The fact that they were elected
is proof the country loves them
just as they are.
And with enough gerrymandering
and voter suppression,
the country will keep electing them
until the bitter end.
At this rate,
about two four-year terms away.

07/13/2017 — If there is something
that needs to be done
and it is yours to do
(and, if there is no one
to do it but you,
it is yours to do),
do not waste time and effort
delaying, dreading,
moaning, mourning,
whining, complaining,
obsessing over it,
depressing about it,
dragging it out,
and around
in a “woe is me
ain’t it awful
poor me
poor me”
kind of way.
Get up and do the thing
with not even an opinion
about it.
It needs doing,
it is yours to do,
do it,
exactly as it needs
to be done,
thinking nothing of it,
and go on to the next thing.
Same approach,
second time around.

07/14/2017 — Republicans are about to vote
to destroy the lives
of 22 million people.
Republicans think they can do so
with impunity–
that they can destroy 22 million lives
with everything else staying
neatly in place
and being exactly the same
after the vote
as it was before the vote.
This is called stupidity.
The destruction of 22 million lives
with have a ripple effect
like, say, 22 million tsunamis,
destroying the lives of those
their lives impacted,
and that level of destruction
will, tsunami-like, wreak its on havoc
on other lives,
and, in no time at all,
well within the lifetimes of those voting,
entire systems supporting life
will topple,
and the end of life as we all know it
will be near to everyone worldwide.
The air will be thick with hopelessness,
chaos will be a word
faintly resembling the outcome
of the Republicans’ flip, casual,
who-woulda-thought-it-
replace-Obamacare-with-anything-
even-nothing-would-be-better-vote.
Destroying 22 million lives
isn’t nothing.
Isn’t close to nothing.
You might call your Republican senators
and tell them that–
while the phone lines still work.

07/14/2017 — A Walk in the Woods 2016 24 Panorama — Indian Land, South Carolina, November 15, 2016

It is essential–
and incumbent upon each of us–
that we understand and embrace
the truth
that benevolence, grace and kindness
are the hope of the world,
and, further,
that these
(and all of the other)
high values hang by the thinnest of threads:
our willingness and ability
to bear the pain
of being benevolent, gracious and kind–
and go on being benevolent, gracious and kind–
in the stark absence
of encouraging outcomes and results.
We have to ground ourselves
in the value of the high values,
and live to exhibit, express, incarnate them
in our life
in season and out of season,
through all times,
and places,
and circumstances,
whether we feel like it or not,
whether we want to or not,
whether we are in the mood for it or not,
whether anything comes of it or not,
for no other reason
than because we believe
in the foolishness
of living in the service
of the high values–
because that is what we do
in a “what I do is me,
for that I came”
(Gerard Manley Hopkins)
kind of way.

07/14/2017 — It is crucial
that we all live in ways
which help someone else
carry on.
In this way,
we all carry on.
And everything depends upon,
and flows from,
that.

07/14/2017 — Part of our work
is to carry on
in ways
that enable others
to carry on–
to be good
for one another–
to be sources
of hope and encouragement,
vitality, confidence and resolve–
all of the high values
at the heart of being human.
We are to live in ways
that bring out the best
in ourselves and others,
and enable us all
to carry on.
This is a “categorical imperative”
(Immanuel Kant)
incumbent upon every one of us.

07/14/2017 — We look at the truth
and see different things.
If we accept that
as the foundational given
defining and limiting
our life together,
we can,
respecting one another
and honoring the variations
that exist among us
regarding the way
we apprehend
and respond to
reality,
talk civilly among ourselves
about the ways
we see what we look at
and why we see–
what hidden but compelling
filters influence our seeing–
the way we do.
That would at least
have the potential
of enabling each of us
to expand our field of vision
to take into account
more than we would
ever notice on our own.

07/14/2017 — What’s wrong with this for an idea:
Why don’t we help
the old,
the poor,
the injured,
the ill and chronically ill,
without anyone
other than
the old,
the poor,
the injured,
the ill and chronically ill
getting anything out of it?

07/14/2017 — Jesus said,
“Why don’t you decide
for yourselves what is right?”
I would add,
“And DO it!”
Listen to what your heart,
your stomach,
your body–
NOT your head!–
tells you is right,
and do it.
And, if it turns out badly,
a) that doesn’t mean it was wrong–
it means it was the first step
in a series of connected results,
and you have to wait until
the entire scenario plays out
before you issue a verdict, and
b) keep listening to your heart,
your stomach,
your body–
NOT your head!–
tells you is right,
and do it.
The rule is,
if your heart/stomach/body
leads you into a mess,
look to their guidance
to lead you out of the mess.
Your heart/stomach/body
is your most reliable guide
in all forms of life choices.
If trusting them brings you to a dead end,
trust them to get you backed out of there.
And if they are telling you
Don’t listen to me,
don’t listen to me

07/15/2017 — A Walk in the Woods 2016 20 Panorama — Indian Land, South Carolina, November 15, 2016

The Right and the Left live in different words,
have different world-views,
different ideas about what is good
and what is not.
It’s AM talking to FM–
VHS talking to VCR–
8-track to DVD…
One side’s idea of the center
is the other side’s idea of the far extreme.
How are we going to
work out what it means
to exhibit, express and exude
“Liberty and Justice for All”?
To understand that
“Equal is Equal”?
That the right to
“Life, Liberty and the Pursuit of Happiness”
belongs to–
and must be honored and defended by–
everyone without restriction exception,
exemption or exclusion?
Jesus would have more compassion
for white supremacists
than white supremacists
would have for Jesus,
being the swarthy, freak-loving
Jew that he is.
And I don’t know what
to do about that.

07/25/2017 — Dissidents are locked away in China,
and assassinated in Russia–
and the extreme Right in the USA
applauds
and adores Trump
for his admiration of Strongman feats
of ruthlessness, cruelty and vindictiveness.
Trump has no interest
in recognizing, defending, championing
human/civil rights.
Liberty, Justice, Equality
are concepts/values wasted on him.
Brutality, Viciousness, Atrocity
are more to his taste.
And his base trends in that direction.
There is a saying:
“When Wrong rises up to be Wrong,
Right must rise up to be Right.”
Meet Wrong With Right
is the guiding slogan–
and that implies non-violence
and civil resistance
in letting no Wrong go unnamed
and unopposed.
It takes vigilance,
dedication,
and determination
in unrelenting service
to the high values,
but that’s our role
and our calling.
To do less
is to give way to Wrong,
and that would be
the really wrong thing to do!

07/15/2017 — Play your heart out!
Don’t keep score!
Those are the rules of the game.
If you abide by the rules,
you will transform the world.

07/16/2017 — A Walk in the Woods 2016 31 — Indian Land, South Carolina, November 15, 2016

Grace is indiscriminate.
Mercy is indiscriminate.
Justice is indiscriminate.
Goodwill is indiscriminate.
Empathy is indiscriminate.
Kindness is indiscriminate.
Goodness is indiscriminate.
Generosity is indiscriminate.
Helpfulness is indiscriminate.
Faithfulness is indiscriminate.
Compassion is indiscriminate.
Benevolence is indiscriminate.
(And so on…)
Once discrimination enters the picture
it all goes to hell.
Once we begin to withhold
the essential elements–
the vital signs–
of relationship
because of something
about another
that we don’t like,
find distasteful,
goes against our religion
or our idea of how things ought to be,
the foundations give way,
and society becomes
an association
of the fearful and untrustworthy–
a conglomeration
of factions
competing for the upper hand.
How are you going to live
is the question.
Who can trust you
to be their friend?
To guard their best interest?
To tend their basic needs?
To be a safe place
to relax and restore their soul?
Who has to be vigilant
in your presence?
To give you wide berth
and hide from your wrathful glare?
How are you living
in ways that are welcoming?
How are you living
in ways that are not?
We hold the key
to making things
more like they could be
than they are.
It all begins with me
and you,
and you,
and you…

07/16/2017 — How fully does your
body of work
exhibit what you
have to offer?
Disclose your gifts?
Incarnate who you are?
Bring you forth in the world?
Are you revealed or concealed
by the way you
have lived your life?
What adjustments
can you imagine/make
that will deepen,
expand,
enlarge
the ways you go about
exploring,
experiencing,
expressing,
being you
in the time left for living?

07/16/2017 — We are a fearful,
lazy,
lot.
We hate uncertainty,
unpredictability.
We crave absolutes,
boundaries,
limits,
restrictions.
We are forever
structuring
our life,
building walls
to keep out
the unwanted,
the unknown,
the unknowable.
Structure
is predictability,
is dependability,
is reassurance,
is peace,
is life,
is death.
We prefer life
in a prison cell
with all the amenities
to life in the jungle
scrounging for food
struggling to keep
from becoming food.
But.
Even in the jungle,
you can bet
we would surround
ourselves with rituals
and taboos,
superstitions
and traditions,
do’s and don’t’s
to order our life
and keep us safe
from the encroaching
unknown.

07/16/2017 — We believe in right answers
to the questions no one can answer.
Does God (as an external, objective reality) exist?
Is there a Heaven?
Is here a Hell?
Is Satan (as an external, objective reality) real?
Is life worth living?
Why are we here?
…
We take someone else’s answers
“on faith,”
as though they know what
they are talking about,
and go on with our life.
Why not just make up
our own answers?
Or stop asking the questions?
Why pretend to know
what cannot be known?
Why go to war,
make enemies
and kill them,
over things that cannot be known?
Why can’t we simply live our life
based on what our experience
tells us is good–
always evaluating,
reviewing,
revising,
adjusting that
in light of continuing experience?

07/16/2017 — The three magic words
that constitute the
foundation of Physical Therapy
and the ground
of convalescence
and recovery
are: “Don’t push it!”
They apply on every level
of health and life.
How do we know when
we are pushing it?
Listen to your body.
Be attentive to your experience.
Live mindfully aware
of each present moment.
The secret of elixir of life.

07/16/2017 — We will never know
what thinking what we think about
keeps us from thinking about
until we stop thinking
what we think about.
The best way I can think of
of doing that
is to change what we are doing
that we have to think about.
Stop texting and talking on the phone,
for instance.
Stop watching TV.
Reduce the amount of time
we spend in conversation.
Sit quietly.
Walk without headphones/music.
Drive without music.
Practice mindful awareness.
See how long it takes
to begin thinking about things
you never thought about.

07/16/2017 — God doesn’t play favorites.
There is no recognition of merit,
no reward for doing it
the way it ought to be done.
There is nothing in it for us
beyond the satisfaction
of having done
what was ours to do
the way it needed
us to do it.
How well we meet life’s challenges
is our glory
or our shame.

07/16/2017 — Our moral authority
is grounded in our integrity–
our oneness
with what is most important to us.
It is the identity of saying and doing–
the sameness of being
who we say we are.
We do not think our way
to this place.
We live our way there
through long years
fits and starts,
wrong turns
and dead ends–
learning through it all
what matters most,
as though our life is teaching us
who we are
and waiting on us
to realize
what has been so all along.

07/16/2017 — When we vote for one person
because we hate someone else,
we are likely to find ourselves
in the worst of all possible worlds.
All action that springs from hatred
it toxic to all concerned.
The directive,
“Strive to do no harm,”
requires compassion
for implementation.
Without compassion,
the world is an uninhabitable wasteland
and will remain so
until the people learn to live
with charity and benevolence
for one another
and all sentient beings.

07/17/2017 — A Walk in the Woods 2016 39 — Indian Land, South Carolina, November 15, 2016

All we have to work with is our life.
How we live is the gift we give to the world.
Who we show ourselves to be
through the process of living our life
is the wake we cut,
the legacy we leave behind.
Forget believing in some preacher’s spiel
as the way to make up
for not having lived–
live to be alive
in the time and place
of your living!
Believe whatever it takes
to be alive here, now!
When you do the chores
do them in ways
that bring you to life!
When you run your errands,
do them in ways
that announce your presence
and evidence your vitality!
Birth yourself into every moment!
Live so as bless every scene
with the annunciation of your arrival!
Make them all glad
to share your company
and delight in your life!
We are only here for a short time–
why not make it worthwhile?

07/17/2017 — “Fake News!” doesn’t
necessarily mean the news is wrong,
just that the news is bad,
and therefore, the implication:
“Death to the Messenger!”
“Fake News” equals “Lying Damn Media,”
equals “Attack the Damn Reporters!”
Trump leads the cheers
of those who have
had nothing but bad news
all their lives.
He appears to them
to be one of them,
if you can believe that.
He is their kind.
He understands them.
He sings their song.
Calling him “Deplorable,”
calls them “Deplorables,”
which is the way they have felt
all their lives.
Gives them instant community,
instant camaraderie,
instant family,
something to embrace
and be proud of,
something they have never had.
Now they have it,
along with a mission,
a purpose,
a calling,
a goal:
Love and serve the Lord
through all of his strange
and mysterious ways!
Attacks on their Lord
are attacks on his base,
deepening their bond
and assuring their faithfulness.
We have all been
painted into a corner.
It is best to realize it is so
and consider it for what it is:
The inevitable outcome
of hopelessness
and “quiet desperation”
(Thoreau)
with no one to give voice
to their anguish
or articulate their plight.
The irony is they pin their hopes
on a savior who offers them
nothing but sound bites
and shadow promises,
and who can only escape
the eventual realization
of his deception
by blaming his fall
on his enemies in the press
and the Liberal Establishment.
Those of us who have been pressed
into the corner with them
have to take all of this into account,
and recognize the need for compassion,
benevolence and grace
in healing the wounds of the people
(ourselves included)
and finding the way forward together.
We who would not build The Wall,
have to do the work of tearing down the wall
that exists between us and “them.”
It is all US in the corner!
We have to listen to the cacophony
of songs, stories and voices
until we can all get to the WE
coursing through us all,
and see the one in the many
and the many in the one
in a “Thou Art That” kind of way.

07/17/2017 — We are living our life
the way it needs us to live it.
The question is not,
“What do you want
to do with your life?”
but, “What does your life
want you to do?”
“What is your life asking of you?”
“What does your life need from you?”
“What are you and your life
teaming up to do?”
Sitting with our life
and working out together
“Here we are–now what?”
is the task of a lifetime:
Our lifetime.

07/18/2017 — A Walk in the Woods 2016 32 — Indian Land, South Carolina, November 15, 2016

I’m interested in our Inner Circle.
I assume we all either have one or wish we did.
I wonder:
How many people are in our Inner Circle?
Do they know they belong to our Inner Circle?
Do they ever get together as Our Inner Circle–
and if so, how often?
Do they like one another?
Would they be in each other’s Inner Circle?
Do we “call on” our Inner Circle as individuals,
or as a group?
Do people move in and out of our Inner Circle?
On what Basis–
How do we determine who is in our Inner Circle,
and who is not?
Can people who are deceased be in our Inner Circle?
Can people who are fictional characters be in our Inner Circle?
In what ways does our Inner Circle assist us with our life?
In what ways might our Inner Circle fail us?
In what ways might we fail them?
Can people we never thought of as being in our Inner Circle
come through for us in ways that put them there?
What does it mean to “come through for us”?
How about: To reliably be what we need,
when and where we need it?
How many people can we count on
to be what we need, when and how we need it?
Are women better at “Inner Circling” than men?
It seems to me that a capacity for “Inner Circling”
would entail a capacity for intimacy and vulnerability
(we can’t be intimate if we won’t be vulnerable)
and I wonder if I am correct about that.
As we age, do we make more use of our Inner Circle?
Less use?
Does it disappear as we outlive our friends/relatives?
Are we ever so alone that we cannot conjure up
our Inner Circle
and be comforted by their presence,
and guided by their wisdom?
(And, as an aside, I wonder how often, if at all,
you engage in imaginary conversations/dialogue–
and are you deepened, expanded, enlarged, directed,
comforted in so doing?)

07/18/2017 — Jesus was a polarizing element
in the Jewish society of his day.
You loved him or you hated him.
You resonated with him
or were turned off by him.
You understood him
or you didn’t get a thing he said.
He said, “If you aren’t with me,
you are against me.”
And another time he said,
“If you aren’t against me,
you are with me.”
He was saying,
“One way or another,
you are going to have
a reaction to me.
You are going to have
to deal with me.”
It wasn’t something people
had to think about.
It wasn’t that they
couldn’t make up
their mind about Jesus.
There was instant,
spontaneous,
recognition or rejection.
Jesus turned you on,
or turned you off.
“I’ve come to divide families
and destroy close friendships,”
he said (Or words to that effect).
That’s the way it is with truth.
We hear it and we react to it.
“Black lives matter”
stirs something in all of us.
“LGBTQ rights,”
“Muslim rights,”
“Voter rights,”
“Women’s rights,”
“Human rights,”
“Civil rights,”
strikes a cord with this one,
and makes that one fighting mad.
Truth is divisive.
It forces decision on us.
It shows us who we are.
It frees us and binds us
at the same time.
We don’t get to choose.
The choice is made for us
by come compelling force
within us.
“Yes!”
“No!”
Are automatic responses
to the encounter with truth.

07/18/2017 — Tell me I must love
changing flat tires,
and threaten me
with severe penalties
and woeful humiliations
until I do–
and I will tell you
that you must love me
for not loving
to change flat tires,
and that you will have
as easy a time loving me
as I will have loving that.
We can love what we love
and we may come to love
what we do not love,
but not on command,
and not by striving mightily.

I’m interested in the objective reality of the Psyche–
the “Unconscious” part of ourselves
(“unconscious” because we are not conscious of it)–
and in the psychic connections that exist
within each of us (between conscious and unconscious)
and among all of us,
and in the psychic disruptions that exist
within us and among us.
The experience and exploration of the Psyche
and its relationship with the Conscious–
between the Unconscious Mind
and the Conscious Mind–
is the valid ground of all good religion
and the sole (soul) justification
of the church-as-it-might-yet-be.
The experience of falling in love
is a psychic phenomenon.
The experience of resonance
is a psychic phenomenon.
The experience of meaning,
of peace,
of belonging,
of despair,
loss
and sorrow…
are psychic phenomenons.
We–WE–are psychic phenomenons,
solid evidence of psychic reality,
yet, we like to think
we are all logic and rationality,
while illogical and irrational behavior
rules our lives!
You are where you are,
I am where I am,
because of choices and decisions
we cannot begin to explain
or understand.
We could do a better job
of “getting to the bottom” of it–
of consciously participating in “it,”
of belonging to “it,”
of cooperating/collaborating with “it,”
of being the living expression of “it”
that we are!

07/19/2017 — I cannot empthetically or compassionately
put myself in the place
of Senate Republicans,
and imagine destroying
the lives of 22-33 MILLION people
in the service of the idea of smaller government
and a tax cut of nearly a trillion dollars
for people making in excess of $200,000 a year.
How can they be flip and casual about that?
How can they ridicule and shame
fellow Republican Senators
for not joining them
in that appalling, ruthless act?
Who are these people?
How did they rise to this level of power and control?
What is so valuable about the ideal
of smaller government–
particularly when the idea can be
conveniently shoved aside
in the area of women’s rights,
LGBTQ rights,
Transgender rights,
Voter rights, etc.?
They are for smaller government
when it comes to social programs
and huge government
when it comes to military expenditures
and imposing the religious ideas
of the Religious Right
upon the nation as a whole.
And they see nothing wrong
with anything they do.
That is completely beyond
the sphere
of empathy and compassion.

07/19/2017 — The unacknowledged–yet undeniably apparent–ground
of Trump’s and Tea Party Republican’s
rabid-beyond-reason opposition to Obamacare
is their racially-fueled hatred of Barack Obama,
and their manic-obsession with erasing
all memory of him from their minds
and the annals of time.
Their hatred of Obama
flows from their hatred of black people generally,
and from their hatred of people who are different
(immigrants, Muslims, LGBTQ’s, etc.)–
hence their affinity with
white supremacists,
(white) nationalism,
and the Far Right
(the By Far White).
Racism,
Xenophobia,
Islamophobia,
Homophobia,
Misogyny
are at the root cause
of the insanity
of current political policy.
Insanity breeds insanity.
We deal with it best
by seeing it for what it is
and knowing it cannot be appeased,
only opposed at every turn.

Carl Jung thought the Psyche–
which he termed “Anima”–
appeared as the “inner woman”
in dreams of men,
and as the “inner man”–
which he termed “Animus”–
in dreams of women,
the two core archetypes
of the unconscious mind.
It may help our conscious mind
apprehend our unconscious mind
if we think in symbols–
and genetics.
Everything about living things
comes packed in our DNA.
And evolutionary genetics
can be thought of
as the science of spirituality,
or the method by which
“inside” appears to be “outside,”
and the “man” moves from within
to “upstairs.”
It doesn’t do away with religion,
but reframes religion as the means
by which conscious relates to unconscious,
and we grow in our ability
to “know what we know”
and align ourselves with ourselves
for the good of the whole–
the whole person
and the whole world.

07/20/2017 — Why are there only three Senate Republicans–
Collins, Capito and Murkowski–
who are willing to risk themselves
to the wrath and vengeance
of their own Party
to defend and protect the welfare
of their constituents
and 33 Million Americans
who would lose health-care
under the plan to repeal the Affordable Care Act?
Why? Why? WHY?

07/20/2017 — I have a dreadful hunch
that Republicans will continue
to be re-elected
no matter how much damage
they do to the country–
because of gerrymandering
and voter suppression,
and because they have buried
an irrational fear
in their constituency
of how much worse Democrats
would be:
“At least we have our GUNS!”
“At least our children aren’t
being taught EVOLUTION!”
“At least THE BIBLE isn’t being burned!”
“At least GLOBAL WARMING has been dismissed!”
Welcome to the new dark ages.

07/20/2017 — Ignorance has nothing to do
with education.
Ignorance cannot be educated
out of existence.
Ignorance is a refusal to see
what is looked at,
an inability to assess
a fact as factual.
It sees what it wants to see,
it believes what it
is comfortable believing,
and facts are whatever
it says facts are.
People enjoy being ignorant
because it doesn’t ask
anything of them,
or require them
to grow up in any way.

07/20/2017 — I’ve never known reason
to win an argument
with irrationality born
of ignorance,
fear,
loathing,
greed
or anger-
a description which characterizes
Tea Party Republicans
and the Religious Right
who are running the Party
that runs the country.
Which leaves us
with talking to everybody else
in seeking enough votes
to turn things toward a future
holding out life and hope,
liberty and justice,
for all.

07/20/2017 — We have 50 Republicans in the Senate,
and 240 in the House
who are doing everything possible
to end health-care coverage
for 33 million Americans–
which would effectively
destroy life as they know it,
and indirectly devastate the lives
of those responsible for their care
and the lives of others in supportive services.
I have quite literally
never heard of anything
as despicable, detestable, ruthless and wrong.
These 290 Republicans
look for all the world
like regular, normal, decent, loving and caring
human beings.
No one would ever guess
they are monsters and ghouls
without hearts and souls.
But they cannot deny that,
no matter how much
they might like to pretend
it isn’t so.

07/21/2017 — I cannot remember a time
when so much hangs in the balance
and is on the line.
Russia has at least two fronts:
1) The election interference
and all its paths of entanglements.
2) The loans, investments and financial ties
with Trump and his “Organization.”
There is the Health-care fiasco
made way more complicated
than it needs to be
to provide affordable health care
to all people
by Republican ideology
and special interests.
And then, there is the Budget Process
with it’s hidden tax cuts
and its reduction/eradication
of necessary services,
also complicated by
Republican ideology
and special interests.
And these three areas of concern
conceal Trump’s closing down
the support system for the ACA,
his flooding federal courts
with extreme Right judges,
his crippling the government
by shuttering agencies
and firing or transferring
federal employees…
The strategy seems to be
Destroy As Much As Possible
As Fast as Possible
And Overwhelm
The Resistance
With Too Much To Resist.
We who would resist
cannot allow ourselves
to become numb and unresponsive!
Our place is to see, know,
and make known!
The appalling and obscene
cannot become normal and acceptable
by being profuse and abounding!
Object!
Protest!
Denounce!
Defy!

We have to make the time
to process the experience
of each day’s episodes–
to recall, review, reflect, realize
what happened,
and what its impact on us
was and continues to be.
We have to slow life down
by opening ourselves to it,
becoming aware of it,
and letting it be
because it is.
Our reaction to the events
of the day
carries weight unnoticed
until we consider that aspect
of those events.
It is the opinion we have
about what happens
that creates the stress
that takes its toll.
Sitting with it all,
holding the events of the day
and our opinion of them
in our awareness–
without embellishment,
simply allowing them
to be part of the day–
provides a perspective
that takes everything into account
without being undone
by any of it,
and assists us
in being ready for tomorrow.

We have to be clear
about what matters most to us
and be conscious of that
as the grounding truth of our life,
upon which we stand
and around which we coalesce,
in all the times and places
of our living.
We live in the service of what?
We live to express, exhibit, incarnate what?
We live to make plain
our loyalty, devotion, allegiance to what?
What is the core value–
the core values–
that constitute(s) the essential nature
of who we are in the world?
In what ways is that value–
are those values–
reflected in the way we live?
How would people know,
in looking at our life,
what is important to us?
How is that value–
are those values–
borne out in our life?
We must be steadily aware
of that–
and of how the impact
of our life experience
alters the value/values
at the core of who we are,
and how that is then
made evident in how we live.
Our life is our values,
our values are our life.
We live to make known
what matters most to us–
in all times and places,
conditions and circumstances,
of our living.
Nothing else matters
beyond the service
of what matters most.

07/22/2017 — Every year, my Doctor asks,
“How’s your energy level?”
Every year, I answer,
“It’s beneath rock bottom
for the things I don’t like to do,
and as high as up goes
for the things I love to do.”
“Go where your energy takes you!”
he says.
“I’ll do my best!” I say.
I don’t get better advice anywhere.